XIV.

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In closing this Appendix, which might be extended to almost any length, as recollections which did not occur to me in writing the body of the work come up, I cannot omit a remarkable use of the American language, let us say, since the Czar once so denominated the English tongue. It was upon the part of a town constable, perhaps as nearly of the Dogberry type as could be imagined. I was standing in the town hall, at a moment preliminary to a public meeting. A knot of youngsters had been joking one another, when this authoritative official approached. All but one speedily retired before the awful presence. “Master Constable” addressed the lingerer: “Disperge,”—a difficult operation for an individual,—“disperge, I say; we can’t have no burlash here!”

Even Shakespeare might have been glad of such an opportunity to enlarge the cacology, by actual hearing, of some of his most amusing characters.


[13]

Quoted in Dasent’s “Jest and Earnest.” London, 1873.

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