20
THE CHEMAW A AM ERICAN
to see a great w ay.”
’Ou, ay, ou, ay, a ferry great w ay.”
Ah, you will see America from here?’ ’
“ Farther than that,” said Donald.
“ Ah! how’s that?”
“ Ou, juist wait till the mists gang
awa’ , an’ you ’ll see the moon.”
M A D E H IM “ E A T I l l s W O R D S ”
We often hear the expression, “ i ’ll
make him eat his words” — meaning that
he will have to take back some statement
he had made.
This expression dates
back to times when people who were so
unfortunate as to have written or printed
something which did not please their
rulers, they were made actually to “ eat”
their words.
It is related that in Russia for instance,
when the censorship was even more se
vere there than it is now, the author of a
book incurred the displeasure of the au
thorities by an essay in which he urged
against the unlimited power of the czar.
The offender was condemned to “ eat
his words,” and he had to do it before
all the chief officials of the place and a
big assemblage of the populace.
A scaffold was put up in the public
square and the leaves of the condemned
book were torn out and fed to the writer
one at a time. A t first he refused to
swallow them but on being threatened
with the bastinado he chewed up the
paper and gulped it down. Finally when
the doctor in attendance decided that he
had all he could stand without being
killed he was let off. It’s lucky people
don t have to eat their own words now
adays, else some of them would have
chronic indigestion.