Gleanings from the Harvest-Fields of Literature: A Melange of Excerpta
General
Gleanings from the Harvest-Fields of Literature: A Melange of Excerpta
Literary curiosa; Literature -- Dictionaries
There was a man bespoke a thing,
Which when the maker home did bring,
That same maker did refuse it,—
The man that spoke for it did not use it,—
And he who had it did not know
Whether he had it, yea or no.
True it is, that if this non-intercourse shall ever be, in reality,
subtended over us, the similitude will fail in a material point. The
poor tenant of the coffin is ignorant of his state. But the people of
the United States will be literally buried alive in non-intercourse, and
realize the grave closing on themselves and on their hopes, with a full
and cruel consciousness of all the horrors of their condition.
SINGULAR INTERMARRIAGES.
There were married at Durham, Canada East, an old lady and gentleman,
involving the following interesting connections:—
The old gentleman is married to his daughter’s husband’s mother-in-law,
and his daughter’s husband’s wife’s mother. And yet she is not his
daughter’s mother; but she is his grandchildren’s grandmother, and his
wife’s grandchildren are his daughter’s step-children. Consequently the
old lady is united in the bonds of holy matrimony and conjugal affection
to her daughter’s brother-in-law’s father-in-law, and her
great-grandchildren’s grandmother’s step-father; so that her son-in-law
may say to his children, Your grandmother is married to my
father-in-law, and yet he is not your grandfather; but he is your
grandmother’s son-in-law’s wife’s father. This gentleman married his
son-in-law’s father-in-law’s wife, and he is bound to support and
protect her for life. His wife is his son-in-law’s children’s
grandmother, and his son-in-law’s grandchildren’s great-grandmother.
A Mr. Harwood had two daughters by his first wife, the eldest of whom
was married to John Coshick; this Coshick had a daughter by his first
wife, whom old Harwood married, and by her he had a son; therefore, John
Coshick’s second wife could say as follows:—
My father is my son, and I’m my mother’s mother;
My sister is my daughter, and I’m grandmother to my brother.
PROPHETIC DISTICH.
In the year 1531, the following couplet was found written on the wall
behind the altar of the Augustinian monastery at Gotha, when the
building was taken down:—
MC quadratum, LX quoque duplicatum,
ORAPS peribit et Huss Wiclefque redibit.
MC quadratum is MCCCC, i.e. 1400. LX duplicatum is LLXX, i.e. 120 =
1520. ORAPS is an abbreviation for _ora pro nobis_ (pray for us). The
meaning is, that in the sixteenth century praying to the saints will
cease, and Huss and Wickliffe will again be recognized.
THE NUMBER OF THE BEAST.
VIC_AR_IV_S_ _F_ILII D_E_I.
5 + 1 + 100 + 1 + 5 + 1 + 50 + 1 + 1 + 500 + 1 = 666.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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