Flowers from a Persian Garden and Other Papers by W. A. Clouston
page 304 of 355 (85%)
page 304 of 355 (85%)
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handed to him that he might read a verse. He could not read a word,
however, which a scholar who chanced to be present observing, he stood behind him and prompted him with the verse he was to read; but coming towards the end, the man's thumb happened to cover the remaining words, and so the scholar, in a low voice, said: "Take away thy thumb," which words the man, supposing them to form part of the verse he was reading, repeated aloud, "Take away thy thumb"--whereupon the judge ordered him to be taken away and hanged. And in Taylor's _Wit and Mirth_ (1630): "A fellow having his book [that is, having read a verse in the Bible] at the sessions, was burnt in the hand, and was commanded to say: 'May God save the King.' 'The King!' said he, 'God save my grandam, that taught me to read; I am sure I had been hanged else.'" The verse in the Bible which a criminal was required to read, in order to entitle him to the "benefit of clergy" (the beginning of the 51st Psalm, "Miserere mei"), was called the "neck-verse," because his doing so saved his neck from the gallows. It is sometimes jestingly alluded to in old plays. For example, in Massinger's _Great Duke of Florence_, Act iii, sc. 1: _Cataminta_.--How the fool stares! _Fiorinda_.--And looks as if he were conning his neck-verse; and in the same dramatist's play of _The Picture_: Twang it perfectly, As if it were your neck-verse. In the anonymous _Pleasant Comedy of Patient Grissell_ (1603), Act ii, |
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