A gentleman who was in the habit of interlarding his discourse with the expression “I say,” having been informed by a friend that a certain individual had made some ill-natured remarks upon this peculiarity, took the opportunity of addressing him in the following amusing style of rebuke:—“I say, sir, I hear say you say I say ‘I say’ at every word I say. Now, sir, although I know I say ‘I say’ at every word I say, still I say, sir, it is not for you to say I say ‘I say’ at every word I say.” PATH-OLOGY. There once resided in Ayrshire a man who, like Leman, proposed to write an Etymological Dictionary of the English language. Being asked what he understood the word _pathology_ to mean, he answered, with great readiness and confidence, “Why, the art of _road-making_, to be sure.” THE PRONUNCIATION OF OUGH. The difficulty of applying rules to the pronunciation of our language may be illustrated in two lines, where the combination of the letters _ough_ is pronounced in no less than seven different ways, viz.: as _o_, _uff_, _off_, _up_, _ow_, _oo_, and _ock_:— §Though§ the §TOUGH COUGH§ and §HICCOUGH PLOUGH§ me §THROUGH§, O’er life’s dark §LOUGH§ my course I still pursue. The following attempts to show the sound of _ough_, final, are ingenious:— _Though_ from _rough cough_ or _hiccough_ free, That man has pain _enough_ Whose wounds _through plough_, sunk in a _slough_, Or _lough_ begin to _slough_. ’Tis not an easy task to show, How o, u, g, h, sound; since _though_, An Irish _lough_, an English _slough_, And _cough_, and _hiccough_, all allow Differ as much as _tough_ and _through_, There seems no reason why they do. “Husband,” says Joan, “’tis plain enough That Roger loves our daughter; And Betty loves him too, although She treats his suit with laughter. “For Roger always hems and coughs, While on the field he’s ploughing; Then strives to see between the boughs, If Betty heeds his coughing.” The following _jeu d’esprit_, entitled “A Literary Squabble on the pronunciation of Monckton Milnes’s Title,” is stated to have been the production of Lord Palmerston:—