The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 — John Shaqi
The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851Various
History
The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851
Various
Art, Modern -- 19th century -- Periodicals; Literature, Modern -- 19th century -- Periodicals; Science -- History -- Periodicals
English travellers in America give very minute accounts of the bad
grammar and questionable pronunciation they sometimes hear among our
common people: with what advantage they might go into the rural
neighborhoods of their own country for exhibitions in this line is shown
by the following description of a scene in a booth, which one of the
characters of Mr. Kingsley enters at night:
"Sadder and sadder, Lancelot tried to listen to the
conversation of the men around him. To his astonishment he
hardly understood a word of it. It was half articulate, nasal,
guttural, made up almost entirely of vowels, like the speech of
savages. He had never before been struck with the significant
contrast between the sharp, clearly-defined articulation, the
vivid and varied tones of the gentleman, or even of the London
street-boy, when compared with the coarse, half-formed growls,
as of a company of seals, which he heard round him. That single
fact struck him perhaps more deeply than any; it connected
itself with many of physiological fancies; it was the parent of
many thoughts and plans of his after-life. Here and there he
could distinguish a half sentence. An old shrunken man opposite
him was drawing figures in the spilt beer with his pipestem,
and discoursing of the glorious times before the great war,
'when there was more food than there were mouths, and more work
than there hands.' 'Poor human nature,' thought Lancelot, as he
tried to follow one of those unintelligible discussions about
the relative prices of the loaf and the bushel of flour, which
ended, as usual, in more swearing and more quarreling, and more
beer to make it up: 'poor human nature! always looking back, as
the German sage says, to some fancied golden age, never looking
forward to the real one which is coming."
The descriptive powers of the author are illustrated in many fine
passages, of which this delineation of an English day in March will
serve as a specimen:
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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