Thursday, January 07, 2016

 

You Nasty, Vulgar Little Boy

F.D. How, Six Great Schoolmasters, 2nd ed. (London: Methuen & Co., 1905), p. 48 (on George Moberly):
The other story shows his horror of anything approaching what he considered a lack of refinement in speech. He was taking a Horace lesson, in the course of which a boy was put on to construe at the passage, 'Descende caelo,' etc. "Come down from heaven," began the boy, and then went on "'et dic age tibia'—and give us a tune." "You nasty, vulgar little boy," burst out the Doctor, "order your name!" which was the Wykehamical phrase for ordering a flogging.
Id., p. 58:
Another story is interesting as showing the origin of what has become a familiar tale. The occasion was when the division were each composing a vulgus (i.e. a Latin elegiac composition of six verses). A wag, unable to remember the Latin word for ladder, used junior in its place. "What's this?" said the Doctor, "I can't construe it." "Please, sir," was the answer, "ladder: juvenis, lad; junior, ladder." Dr. Moberly, with his rather exaggerated delicacy of taste, was the very last person to whom such jesting would be palatable. "Write me," he said, "two vulguses: one for being a rude lad, and one for not knowing the Latin for ladder."



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