Word: somersdown
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: all
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
...does not lovely Miss Somersdown give her hand to Mr. Bluster? Is it because Bluster, who is inclined to booze, resembles "a walking lump of drink-produced excrescences?" No, no, it is not that at all. It is because Bluster's courting technique is so blistering-"a cold methodical intriguing piece of secularity, without sympathy or sentiment, talent or tenderness." It cannot be compared to the courting methods of manly Nat, who cries from the bottom of his honest heart: "O speak unreservedly to me, Miss Somersdown; if your heart be free and unfettered ... if there be any means...
Britain's E. S. Turner (The Shocking History of Advertising) doubts that all Victorian couples courted with the fluency of Nat and Miss Somersdown, who are taken from a book on courting etiquette of the year 1877. But he believes that their language illustrates one extreme of the art of courting. The Prince Regent (later George IV) showed the opposite extreme when, on being introduced to his bride-to-be, Caroline of Brunswick, he tottered backwards, crying to one of his courtiers: "Harris, I am not well. Pray get me a glass of brandy...
| 1 |