Many persons have believed that this book’s
miraculous stupidities were studied and disingenuous;
but no one can read the volume carefully through and
keep that opinion. It was written in serious
good faith and deep earnestness, by an honest and upright
idiot who believed he knew something of the English
language, and could impart his knowledge to others.
The amplest proof of this crops out somewhere or
other upon each and every page. There are sentences
in the book which could have been manufactured by
a man in his right mind, and with an intelligent and
deliberate purposes to seem innocently ignorant; but
there are other sentences, and paragraphs, which no
mere pretended ignorance could ever achieve —nor
yet even the most genuine and comprehensive ignorance,
when unbacked by inspiration.
It is not a fraud who speaks in the following paragraph
of the author’s Preface, but a good man, an
honest man, a man whose conscience is at rest, a man
who believes he has done a high and worthy work for
his nation and his generation, and is well pleased
with his performance:
We expect then, who the little book (for the care
what we wrote him, and for her typographical correction)
that may be worth the acceptation of the studious
persons, and especially of the Youth, at which we
dedicate him particularly.
One cannot open this book anywhere and not find richness.
To prove that this is true, I will open it at random
and copy the page I happen to stumble upon.
Here is the result:
DIALOGUE 16
For To See the Town
Anothony, go to accompany they gentilsmen, do they
see the town.
We won’t to see all that is it remarquable here.
Come with me, if you please. I shall not folget
nothing what can to merit your attention. Here
we are near to cathedral; will you come in there?
We will first to see him in oudside, after we shall
go in there for to look the interior.
Admire this master piece gothic architecture’s.
The chasing of all they figures is astonishing’
indeed.
The cupola and the nave are not less curious to see.
What is this palace how I see yonder?
It is the town hall.
And this tower here at this side?
It is the Observatory.
The bridge is very fine, it have ten arches, and is
constructed of free stone.
The streets are very layed out by line and too paved.
What is the circuit of this town?
Two leagues.
There is it also hospitals here?
It not fail them.
What are then the edifices the worthest to have seen?
It is the arsnehal, the spectacle’s hall, the
Cusiomhouse, and the Purse.
We are going too see the others monuments such that
the public pawnbroker’s office, the plants garden’s,
the money office’s, the library.
Copyrights
The 30,000 Dollar Bequest and Other Stories from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.
