Elicited Information

THE CONTRIBUTORS’ CLUB.

IT happened once that school-teaching was thrust upon me for a short season ; and I find, in looking over some of the examination papers belonging to the pupils, that my labors were not quite without results, some of which, if unexpected or unusual, are at least suggestive.

For instance, should we understand that soap was formerly used more freely among the Italians than in these days we might be led to suppose, because a student of Roman history writes, “ Herculaneum and Pompeii were destroyed by a stream of lather ” ? And is there more than meets the eye in this statement, “ When the Greeks and Romans became Christians, then they had more to quarrel about ” ? Is this further announcement to be disputed, “ Alexandria was one of the chief cities of iniquity ” (antiquity) ?

In these days of hygienic feeding and much teaching thereof, the following rèsumé of our requirements is gratifying for its simplicity and comprehensiveness : “ The three necessary sorts of food are carbonaceous, nitrogenous, and nutritious.” It is reassuring to be told by the same student that “ a tooth is so set in the jaw that tlicy are not apt to come out ; ” and according to one’s physical condition is the impression produced by reading that “ the organs and tissues of the body are continually changing ; those which arc present one moment are gone the next ” !

To persons who have forgotten the “ words of the book ” it may be a little bewildering to read that “ a hair under the microscope looks like the roof of a house.” Perhaps the simile would have suggested itself only in a town of shingled roofs. We find among other beneficent provisions of nature that “ the oil-glands are of great use to us : they oil the skin and hair, and keep water out.” So the phrase “ wet to the skin ” acquires new meaning, while “ wet through ” is destined to become obsolete, since science shows it to be an impossible condition. I am sure that only in a reposeful New England town could be written, “ The arm is sometimes used in carrying things and to hit with;” and as an afterthought, or with a sort of Western “ keep-the-change ” prodigality, is added, “ There are two arms, and the leg is something like it.”

On an American history paper I find that “ Molly Pitcher’s husband was wounded, and she went to get some water in a pitcher, and that is how you can remember her name.” Amongthe admirable and impressive facts in the life of Benjamin Franklin it is recorded that “ when he went to bed at night he used to take a book with him and deprive himself of rest.” “ At length, finding himself in America without a penny, he became a great writer ; ” whether because or in spite of the geographical and financial situation is not stated. It is interesting to hear that “ when Andrew Jackson found time he fed the adopted baby.” It is to be hoped that in the intervals some one else “ found time.”

It hardly seems consistent with our notions of Washington’s dignity that he should “ mount a pine log on wheels and parade round with it,” nor should we advocate such an excess of politeness as that shown by Mrs. Motte when “she chose to have her house burned down, since the enemy could not be disobliged ” (dislodged). On the other hand, the Americans were surely rather exacting when “ they ordered the British to lower their collars.”

It is not clear as to whether it was accident, design, or the writer’s arrangement that led one of the patriots “ to store the powder in a house with his wife and his mother-in-law.”

Recent events have justified the laconic answer of “ Riots ” to the inquiry “ What is the practical result of strikes ? ” And perhaps in the last few years the force of the following definition may have been felt : “ A draft is an order that you send to a mail, instead of money, but it has to pass through several hands before the right person gets it.”

The last extract from these papers, containing so many fresh points of view, is one which shows the value to us all of some knowledge of grammar and rhetoric, since “ grammatical form may be shown by speaking and spelling correctly,” and “ apostrophe is that figure of speech in which absent things are addressed as though present, and the ignorant as though intelligent.”