Martin Fone's Blog, page 282
September 23, 2017
Sock Of The Week
A suspicious object around seven inches long and two inches wide was seen protruding from a teenager’s bed in Coventry, I read this week. It being the Wild West that is Coventry and as you do in such circumstances, the family took fright and rang the local RSPCA, thinking that it was a lizard.
Officers duly arrived, the object was scrutinised – it wasn’t moving – and after some deliberation, the verdict was passed. It was nothing more than a pink stripy sock.
The girl got a flea in her ear and was told to take more care in tidying her room.
All in a day’s work for the RSPCA, it would seem.
Filed under: Humour, News Tagged: Coventry, RSPCA, sock mistaken for a lizard, untidy teenagers' rooms
September 22, 2017
What Is The Origin Of (146)?…
Kit and caboodle
When I use this phrase, I use it figuratively to mean the lot, everything there is and usually preface kit with whole. I use the idiom interchangeably with lock, stock and barrel which conveys the same sort of sense. Having used it the other day, I paused and realised I didn’t really understand what it meant.
Of the two components of the idiom, kit is relatively straightforward and is common parlance to this day. As a noun it is used to describe a set of articles or equipment needed for a specific purpose such as to play sports or to provide first aid or the appurtenances we associate with being a member of the military. What is interesting is that it probably owes its origin to the Middle Dutch word kitte which meant a cask or basket made of wooden staves. Over time its sense migrated from the item used to transport stuff to the articles of equipment themselves. By the late 1700s kit had become a portmanteau word to describe “a number of things or persons viewed as a whole, a collection.”
We see from around 1785 onwards, kit spawning a number of idioms to reflect the sense of completeness or a full set. Particularly common in its usage was the whole kit which our old friend, Francis Grose, defined in his Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, as “the whole of a soldier’s necessaries, the contents of his knapsack.” Other variants included kit and cargo and the rather odd kit and biling. It turns out that biling was a regional variant of the word boiling and referred to a pot of stew or soup. More germane to our particular enquiries another expression for the whole lot emerged – the whole kit and boodle.
Our next question, then, is what is a boodle? It seems to have emerged, across the pond as a slang expression for a crowd or pack of things. Later on, its meaning somewhat contracted as it was particularly used to refer to money, especially dosh which had been stolen or otherwise acquired illegally. It is tempting to associate the origin of the word to the same root as a bundle but, equally, it may have been derived from another Dutch word, boedel, which meant money or property.
What is clearer is that just as the whole kit emerged in Blighty as an idiom for the whole lot, so the whole boodle did in the States. The rather beguiling mix of Gothic horror and comedy which is John Neal’s The Down-Easters, published in 1833, contains the line, “I know a feller ‘twould whip the whool boodle of ‘em.” I think we can conclude from this that it was already in common parlance by the time the book was written and the reader would have understood the sense.
By 1848 caboodle had emerged, The Ohio State Journal noting that “the whole caboodle will act upon the recommendation of the Ohio Sun.” Whether they did or not, I know not, but caboodle is used in the same sense as boodle and, indeed, kit. Grammarians will nod sagely and say of course because the prefix ker, also spelt as ca or ka or cur, is often used as a form of intensifier, not adding any particular sense to the word but just strengthening the word.
With two separate expressions knocking around, it was almost inevitable that they would be joined together, particularly as boodle having now attracted an intensifier offered, the opportunity for a rather pleasing form of alliteration. The first citation of our phrase, according to the OED, appeared in the Boston Globe in 1888, “If any ‘railroad lobbyist’ cast reflections on his character he would wipe out the whole kit and caboodle of them.” However, it had appeared in the Syracuse Sunday Standard in November 1884 – “more audiences have been disappointed by him and by the whole kit-and-caboodle of his rivals.”
Filed under: Culture, History Tagged: 1824 Vagrancy Act, boedel, caboodle, Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, Francis Grose, kitte, origin of boodle, origin of kit and caboodle
September 21, 2017
I Predict A Riot – Part Twenty Seven
The Calico Riots of Spitalfields, 1719 – 1720
The glorious revolution of 1688, which reasserted the Protestant ascendancy in England and saw William and Mary of Orange take the throne, saw many changes. One of which was that the Dutch royalists introduced the fashion for wearing printed calicoes. For the uninitiated – I include myself here – calico is a textile made from unbleached cotton. Because it had an unfinished appearance its principal advantages over the more traditional woollen clothing was that it was cooler and considerably cheaper. This fashion trend posed a considerable threat to the traditional woollen industry.
In an attempt to protect the weaving industry in 1700 an Act was passed banning the importation of printed calicoes. However, as there was no equivalent ban on plain calicoes, these became the garments of choice for the fashion conscious and thrifty female.
Silk weavers, many of whom concentrated around the Spitalfields area of east London, were particularly vulnerable to economic downturns. Silk threads were imported and their availability was subject to the vagaries of Anglo-French relations – dire, pretty much of the time – and the activities of smugglers. The period between 1717 and 1719 saw another economic downturn and many silk-weavers were thrown out of work. If the law wouldn’t suppress calico, they would take matters into their own hands.
Civil unrest broke out initially in June 1719 and then in the following month. Women who had the audacity to walk the streets flaunting their calico were set upon by groups of weavers who were wandering the streets looking for trouble. One victim was Dorothy Orwell who was set upon on June 24th 1719. In her testimony to the courts she claimed “she was assaulted by a multitude of weavers in Red-Lion-Fields in Hoxton, who tore, cut and pull’d off her gown and petticoat by violence, threatened her with vile language and left her naked in the fields.”
There are always two sides to a story and one of the leaders of the rioters, by the name of Rey, in an interesting piece of sophistry claimed that the fault lay with the women; “these petit disturbances are properly with the women themselves; which proceeds from the foolish fancy of some and the madness and rage of others.” The lightness of the calico clothing led to suggestions that the morals of their wearers were equally light and loose. The Spitalfields Ballad from 1721 contained the uncompromising lines “none shall be thought/ a more scandalous slut/ than a tawdry Calico Madam.”
Disturbances in the street and attacks on calico-clad women only died down in the autumn when woollen clothing came out of the cupboards. In an attempt to solve the problem a bill was put to Parliament banning the wearing of calico but it was bogged down in the House of Lords. Come the spring of 1720 when the weather had warmed up and calico was again a viable option to wear, there were more attacks on women. Although these were condemned by the weavers’ guild and suppressed by the authorities, it was decided that the only course of action was to legislate again.
The Calico Act was passed in 1721 banning men and women from wearing and using calico for clothing and in household interiors. Fines of five pounds were imposed for wearing the fabric and twenty pounds for selling it and the statute was in force until 1774. However, there was a loophole in the legislation – it did not include domestic furnishings already fitted with calico. Those who really wanted to wear calico simply chopped up their curtains and made clothes out of them!
Filed under: Culture, History Tagged: calico, calico riots of 1719, Dorothy Orwell attacked by weavers, impact of calico on woollen trade, Red Lion Fields in Hoxton, Spitalfields' silk weavers, The Calico Act of 1721, the glorious revolution of 1688, The Spitalfields Ballad
September 20, 2017
Book Corner – September 2017 (3)
What’s Bred In The Bone – Grant Allen
This book, not to be confused with Robertson Davies’ 1985 novel of the same name, is a racy, page-turner, romp of an adventure, mystery story. It was published in 1891and was an entry into a literary competition organised by George Newnes, the publisher of Titbits magazine, which attracted some 20,000 entries. Allen wrote the book in double quick time and scooped the prize of a thousand smackers. It was a sensational success.
By that time he was already a prolific writer, not only of fiction but of articles and books of scientific interest. In particular, he was a stout proponent of evolutionary theory. Today, however, he is pretty much forgotten. Perhaps there are too many vestiges of jingoism and the little Englander for the modern taste. A shame, perhaps, as he knew how to write a ripping yarn.
The story has a bit of everything. A near catastrophic railway accident in which a tunnel collapses leaves the two protagonists, Elsa and Cyril, one of the Waring twins, in close proximity in fear of their life. Inevitably, they fall in love but the path of true love does not run smoothly. Elsa is fascinated by Cyril’s snake – there ought to be a Freudian sub-text to this but this was written in more innocent times – and we soon see she has a hidden side. One of her characteristics, which she shares with her female relatives – they come from Romany stock – is her deep insight into people’s psyches. She is also overcome in moments of high personal drama with the desire to dance with snakes or, at least, a feather boa if a reptile is not to hand. This is England after all.
Yes, the plot is ridiculous but Allen has the panache to pull it off. There is a murder, a case of mistaken identity – having twins as central characters is helpful, I suppose – and the danger of a grave miscarriage of justice. It is not a whodunit – we know who committed the murder – and the main interest of the book is how the innocence of Guy Waring is going to be established, particularly as with each twist and turn of the plot his predicament seems to worsen. I won’t spoil the story but feelings of remorse on the part of the real murderer prompted by Elsa’s astonishing ability to get into their head wins out. The book ends happily ever after with most, if not all, of the loose ends tied up.
Guy’s adventures include a spell digging for diamonds in South Africa – successfully, naturally – and it is this part of the book that may most offend as the natives are depicted as little more than uncouth savages. But, alas, that was the overriding view of the times, even amongst evolutionists and scientists. In a world where we are accustomed to accepting that a good DNA sample will unlock the key to identities, it is fascinating to be reminded that around 120 years ago marital records and ledgers recording births and deaths were of paramount importance. And a chap can’t get around at all without an encyclopaedic knowledge of the railway timetables.
It is a rather dated novel and one which is heavily imbued with the racism and sexism of the age but also one that sheds a fascinating insight into how our forefathers saw the world. The central moral of the story is, as the title points out, that breeding will out and will shine through your actions – a concept that can only prompt a snort of derision today. The plotting is ridiculous and heavily reliant upon coincidence – but then even the best novelists are guilty of having clunking plots – and in less skilled hands the book could easily crash into an unedifying heap. But if you can suspend your prejudices and finer critical judgment, you are in for a great few hours of entertainment.
Filed under: Books, Culture Tagged: Cyril Waring, George Newnes and Titbits literary prize, Grant Allen, Guy Waring, Late Victorian melodrama, What's Bred in the Bone
September 19, 2017
Our Crime Against Criminals Lies In The Fact That We Treat Them Like Rascals – Part Two
The City Bonds mugging, 1990
I’ve never really considered it before but carrying out a mugging is a bit like buying a ticket in a tombola – you are never quite sure what you are going to get, assuming you manage to evade the long arm of the law. Bearer bonds are curious financial instrument in that they are unregistered and one of the attractions is that the absence of ownership records makes them useful for investors who wish to hide under a cloak of anonymity. The downside is that whoever has their mitts on the physical bond is assumed to be the owner – hence the name bearer – and if they fall into the wrong hands, recovery is near on impossible.
Another curious feature of the City of London in the days before electronic trading and the speedy transmission of digitised documents was that important papers used to be walked around the City from trading house to trading house. The messengers, as they were called, in my experience, were mainly ex-military personnel who as well as having the perfect job to maintain their physical condition also had time on their hands to pop into a local in order to wet their whistles. After all, the streets are dusty and hot.
58-year-old John Goddard was employed as a messenger for the money broking firm of Sheppards and stepped out of the office on May 2nd 1990 with a briefcase containing 301 bearer bonds to the tune of £292 million, which he was to walk round to a number of banks and building societies. Around 9.30 am in one of the quiet alleys in the City, he was set upon by a mugger brandishing a knife. Sensibly, Goddard didn’t put up a fight and the assailant, believed to be Patrick Thomas, a petty crook from South London, made off with the loot. It remains to this day the second largest hauls in British criminal history and, astonishingly, relied solely on a knife and a petty thief.
Thomas, if indeed it was he, didn’t live long enough to enjoy the fruits of his audacious mugging. He was found dead in December 1991 from a gunshot wound to the head in December 1991. At least he died without having his collar felt for the crime.
But Thomas was not a lone operator who just got lucky and then unlucky. The police realised that there were bigger brains behind the theft and in conjunction with the FBI launched an operation to bring the felons to justice. A Texan businessman by the name of Mark Lee Osborne came to the attention of the FBI and he was arrested when he tried to sell some of the stolen London bonds to officers posing as members of the Mafia. Osborne sang like a canary and was used to trap another big cheese, Keith Cheeseman, who was arrested in the Barbican.
Cheeseman, out on bail, fled to Tenerife where he was arrested again and deported to the States. He claimed that the reason he scarpered was that he feared that there was a Mafia contract on him. Perhaps there was some truth in the story as his associate, Osborne, was found dead in the boot of a car in Houston with two gun shots to the back of his head. Cheeseman finally stood trial in England in 1993 where he was sentenced to six and a half year in chokey. The police recovered all but two of the bonds. It could only have happened in England.
Filed under: Culture, History Tagged: bearer bonds, Britain's biggest robberies, City bonds mugging 1990, City messengers, Keith Cheeseman, Mark Lee Osborne, Patrick Thomas, Sheppards money brokers, what are bearer bonds
September 18, 2017
A Better Life – Part Thirteen
The Nashoba community
The idea of slavery is abhorrent to us these days but for those campaigning for its abolition in the United States in the first half of the 19th century it was a long, hard struggle which ended in a brutal and bloody civil war. Aside from moral and ethical considerations, two very practical considerations concerned abolitionists – how to prepare slaves for their liberation and how to compensate slave-owners for the loss of their “property.”
The Nashoba community, which occupied around 2,000 acres of land in what is now Germantown in Tennessee, was Frances Wright’s attempt to find a solution to these two pressing concerns. The starting point for Wright was an article she published in the New Harmony Gazette in October 1825, entitled, rather long-windedly, A Plan for the Gradual Abolition of Slavery in the United States, without Danger of Loss to the Citizens of the South. The underlying premise of Wright’s plan was that slave owners were anxious “to manumit their people, but apprehensive of throwing them unprepared into the world.” If their financial loss was compensated for, there would be a queue of owners willing to give their slaves their freedom.
The aim of Nashoba, at least as Wright conceived it, was to provide a half-way house whereby slaves could earn their freedom through honest labour, whilst learning the necessary skills to make a success of their freedom, and then they would be transported to places such as Liberia and Haiti. Wright believed if her commune was a success, it would provide a template to be used across the States. She set about raising money and members. One of her recruits was the Englishman, George Flower, who had established another community in Albion, Illinois. But funds were slow to roll in and membership failed to take off – at its height there were only around twenty members – and Wright had to dig in to her own resources to fund the purchase of the land.
Although Wright thought of the commune as an interracial, egalitarian utopia, it was anything but. The fundamental problem was that the slaves were still slaves until they had earned enough to buy their freedom and had no say in the running of the commune. Francis Trollope visited Nashoba in 1827 and wrote about her visit in Domestic Manners of the Americans, published in 1832. She noted of Wright, “I never saw, I never heard or read, of any enthusiasm approaching hers, except in some few instances, in ages past, of religious fanaticism.” But, zeal was not enough. Trollope went on, “When we arrived at Nashoba, they were without milk, without beverage of any kind except rain water; the river Wolf being too distant to send to constantly. Wheat bread they used but sparingly, and to us the Indian corn bread was uneatable.”
Wright contracted malaria and went to England to convalesce, appointing trustees to manage the commune. They instituted the concept of free love within the commune but it did not improve the lot of the slaves and just increased Nashoba’s problems, fuelling rumours of interracial relationships and causing funding to dry up. Before Wright had got back to the commune in 1828, it had collapsed. At least Wright did the right thing by the remaining 31 slaves, giving them their freedom, shipping them off to Haiti where they were put under the protection of Lafayette and were assured of their liberty.
Filed under: Culture, History Tagged: Demise fo the Nashoba Commune, Domestic Manners of the Americans, Frances Wright, Francis Trollope, Haiti and Liberia as destinations for freed slaves, Lafayette, manumission of slaves, The Nashoba Commune
September 17, 2017
Moral Dilemma Of The Week
Here’s a 21st century dilemma if there ever was one; should you hold a baby whilst drinking a beer?
Australian Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull, had a picture posted on Facebook showing him at a football match, giving his baby grandson a peck on the head while he (Turnbull, not the baby) was holding a bottle of beer. Turnbull was rather pleased with himself, giving the lie to the oft held belief that men can only do one thing at a time.
What he hadn’t anticipated was that the rather charming picture of grandfatherly affection would be interpreted in some quarters as an act of extreme folly, subjecting the poor infant to the noxious fumes of Aussie grog. The tide is turning, though, and even Turnbull’s political opponents are backing him.
Glad the Aussies are focusing on the real issues facing the world. For what it’s worth, I would ditch the baby and hang on to the beer. Cheers!
Filed under: Humour, News Tagged: 21st century moral dilemmas, furore over Turnbull kissing baby while holding a beer, Malcolm Turnbull
September 16, 2017
Ruse Of The Week
I have long since given up going to rock festivals. I find there is nothing more depressing than groups of septuagenarians playing to an audience of sexagenarians desperately trying to recapture their youth. And then there are the security checks – a necessary evil these days – which make it difficult to bring in the amount of alcohol necessary to make such an event bearable.
Some concert-goers resort to hollowing bread sticks to secrete bottles of hooch or pour their liquor into innocuous looking bottles like sun-cream containers. But an American festival goer, Alex Diamond, a regular attendee of the Electric Zoo festival on Randall’s Island, went one better, I read this week.
He visited the concert site some weeks in advance of the festival with a water bottle full of vodka, a spade and a mobile phone. Diamond proceeded to bury the bottle on the site, taking careful note of the precise GPS co-ordinates on his phone. When the festival was on, all he had to do was locate the site again and dig the contraband up, ensuring that he evaded the attentions of the security guards and the all-seeing CCTV cameras. Diamond claims he was inspired by pirates and his ruse worked.
I’m sure his listening pleasure was enhanced by all the trouble he went to.
Filed under: Humour, News Tagged: Alex Diamond, how to evade security checks at rock festivals, man buries vodka to evade security checks, Randall's Island, Zoo Festival 2017
September 15, 2017
What Is The Origin Of (145)?…
Mind your Ps and Qs
When I was a child I was occasionally told to mind my ps and qs, by which my parents meant that I had better behave properly and mind my manners. I instinctively knew what was meant – after all, I had probably committed some misdemeanour or social faux-pas – but over time it began to dawn on me that it was a rather odd phrase. I had always taken it as an abbreviation for the phrase “mind your pleases and thankyous” which has the virtue of reflecting the modern usage. However, as is often the case in the shady world of etymology, not all is at it may seem.
What first sowed seeds of doubt on my understanding of the phrase’s origin was Francis Grose’s definition in his Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, published in 1785; “to mind one’s Ps and Qs – to be attentive to the main chance.” Someone who is on the look-out to gain an advantage isn’t necessarily a person whose manners are impeccable.
And if we delve back into the 17th century there were variants of the phrase – p and q or pee and kew – which were slang expressions for superior or, at least, better quality. The Oxford English Dictionary cites a line from Samuel Rowland’s Knave of Hearts, dating from 1612, which goes “Bring in a quart of Maligo, right true; And looke, you Rogue, that it be pee and kew.” Theories that the p and q are abbreviations for prime quality founder in trying to explain that pesky conjunction in the middle. Some have suggested that the p and q stand for measures of drink, pints and quarts, but that doesn’t look right in the context of Rowland’s usage.
A slightly earlier variant is to be found in Thomas Dekker’s The Untrussing of the Humorous Poet from 1602. Afinius hands Horace a cloak because it looks as though it is going to rain and goes on to comment, “for now thou art in thy Pee and Kue, thou hast such a villainous broad back.” It would seem that the Pee and Kue is a reference to some form of apparel and some have suggested that the Pee relates to a sailor’s pea coat and the Kue to a queue, a form of pigtail.
Another possibility opens up when you consider a poem by Charles Churchill, written in 1763 which told of the travails associated with learning the alphabet. It goes “on all occasions next the chair/ he stands for service of the Mayor/ and to instruct him how to use/ his As and Bs and Ps and Qs.” Rather like bs and ds, ps and qs can cause the aspiring student some difficulties. They are essentially the mirror image of each other and the neophyte may easily transpose one for the other. For jobs which require text to be read back to front, such as the hot metal typography in old-style printing, the two letters can generate mistakes and an element of caution would need to be exercised.
It is hard to make sense of all of these competing claims. My original supposition – an abbreviation of please and thankyou – is unlikely because it is only independently attested in the 20th century. However, I am attracted to the theory that it relates to the difficulties of learning the alphabet, an admonition which then broadened through use to one of a general warning to exercise caution. It may well be that the 17th century usages have no bearing at all to the phrase we use today, perhaps having a different origin which, alas, is lost in the mists of time.
Filed under: Culture, History Tagged: Charles Churchill, Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, Francis Grose, origin of mind your ps and qs, Pee and Kue, The Untrussing of the Humorous Poet, Thomas Dekker
September 14, 2017
They Made Their Mark – Part Two
Robert Cawdrey (circa 1538 – post 1604)
The 16th century was a transformational period for the English language. Thanks to the renewed interest in literature, science, medicine and the arts and the expansion of international trade a large number of new words entered the language at a prodigious rate. For many it was difficult to keep track with it all. Others were concerned that the fashion for peppering speech with fancy new words meant that people were forgetting their mother tongue. As rebel priest and schoolteacher, Robert Cawdrey, wrote, “they forget altogether their mothers language, so that if some of their mothers were alive, they were not able to tell or understand what they say.”
If there was ever a time when someone needed to take stock of the situation and help people navigate their way through the changes in language and understand what the new words meant, this was it. With the assistance of his son, Thomas, Cowdray made it his mission to make sense of what was going on by way of an instructional text which went by the short title of Table Alphabeticall. It was to be the first English language dictionary – previous lexicons had been dual or multi-language affairs.
Cawdrey set out his slightly patronising mission in the longer title to his magnum opus. There we learn that the book consists of “A table alphabeticall conteyning and teaching the true writing, and understanding of hard vsuall English wordes, borrowed from the Hebrew, Greeke, Latine, or French, &c.” His methodology was outlined as was his target audience; “With the interpretation thereof by plaine English words, gathered for the benefit & helpe of ladies, gentlewomen, or any other unskilfull persons.” And he was clear as to the intended benefit of perusing his work; “Whereby they may more easily and better vnderstand many hard English wordes, which they shall heare or read in the Scriptures, Sermons, or elsewhere, and also be made able to vse the same aptly themselues.”
In all, his table alphebeticall contained between 2,500 and 3,000 words. Each word in the list was accompanied by a definition but the definition was short and to the point. Cawdrey did not concern himself with the etymology of the word or citations to demonstrate its usage or any nuances in its range of meanings. His primary concern was to provide the key with which the ordinary person could unlock the meaning of many of these new-fangled words. The relatively low number of entries meant that the dictionary was hardly a comprehensive survey of the language. Rather, Cawdrey concentrated on words which were considered to be hard or unfamiliar to the general language, particularly those derived from Hebrew, Greek, Latin and French.
One of the major innovations of Cawdrey’s dictionary was that the entries appeared in alphabetical order. That this was revolutionary is illustrated by the extraordinary lengths to which Cawdrey went to explain what was meant by alphabetical order and the order in which the letters appeared, the implication being that this was unfamiliar territory for his readers at the time. If for nothing else, we owe Cawdrey a vote of thanks for this and he went some way to achieve his ambition to better organise the English language.
In an age when what passed for education was the preserve of the aristos and wealthy, Cawdrey played no small part in standardising the spelling of words and enhanced the understanding of the basic rules of our wonderful language.
Filed under: Culture, History Tagged: famous lexicographers, introduction of alphabetical order to dictionaries, Robert Cawdrey, Table Alphabettical, the first English dictionary, Thomas Cawdrey, transformation of English language in 16th century
