CHAMBERS'S JOURNAL
OF
POPULAR
LITERATURE, SCIENCE, AND ART.
CONTENTS
FOREIGNERS' ENGLISH.
FROM DAWN TO SUNSET.
THE ROYAL NAVAL RESERVE AND ROYAL NAVAL VOLUNTEERS.
TIM HARGATON'S COURTSHIP.
CLERKS.
A LADY'S JOURNEY IN MOLDAVIA.
THE CHANGES OF COLOUR IN THE CHAMELEON.
MY SWEETHEART.
| No. 715. | SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 8, 1877. | Price 1½d. |
FOREIGNERS' ENGLISH.
At all the tourist-towns abroad British visitors aremuch looked for; and it is amusing to see themode in which inscriptions and advertisementsare drawn up in English, or what is supposed tobe English, for the sake of riveting the attentionof possible guests or customers belonging to the'nation of shopkeepers.' Many tourists have takencopies of these curiosities, which have afterwardsfound their way into print in various forms.
Hotels are famous for these curiosities: thevariety of languages spoken by the visitorssupplying a reason for this. The 'Drei Mohren'(Three Moors) hotel at Augsburg has the followingentry in the visitors' book: 'January 28th, 1815;His Grace Arthur Wellesley, &c. &c. &c.; greathonour arrived at the beginning of this year tothe three Moors; this illustrious warrior, whoseglorious atchievements, which, cradled in India,have filled Europe with his renown, descended init.' At the 'Trois Allies' hotel, Salzburg, somefew years ago, mine host invited English visitorsby the following announcement: 'George Nelböckbegs leave to recommand his hotel to the ThreeAllied, situated vis-a-vis of the birth-home ofMozart, which offers all comforts to the meanestcharges.' The prepositions at and to are greatstumbling-blocks to such concocters of Englishsentences and phrases; the pronouns which andwho not much less so. An hotel-keeper at Rastadtbestowed great pains on an announcement whichwith many others was exhibited in the entrancepassage or hall: 'The underwritten has the honorof informing the public that he has made theacquisition of the hotel to the Savage, well situatedin the middle of this city. He shall endeavor todo all duties which gentlemen travellers can justlyexpect; and invites them to please to convincethemselves of it by their kind lodgings at hishouse'—signed 'Basil Singisem, before the tenant ofthe hotel to the Stork in this city.' If the goodman had hit upon 'Savage Hotel' and 'StorkHotel' he would have been a little more intelligible.
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