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Excerpt

Excerpt from Literary Blunders: A Chapter in the "History of Human Error", by Henry B. Wheatley

Authors and editors are very apt to take
things for granted, and they thus fall into
errors which might have been escaped if
they had made inquiries. Pope, in a note
on Measure for Measure, informs us that the
story was taken from Cinthio's novel Dec. 8
Nov. 5, thus contracting the words decade
and novel. Warburton, in his edition of
Shakespeare, was misled by these contractions,
and fills them up as December 8
and November 5. Many blunders are
merely clerical errors of the authors, who
are led into them by a curious association
of ideas; thus, in the Lives of the
Londonderrys, Sir Archibald Alison, when
describing the funeral of the Duke of
Wellington in St. Paul's, speaks of one of
the pall-bearers as Sir Peregrine Pickle,
instead of Sir Peregrine Maitland. Dickens,
in Bleak House, calls Harold Skimpole
Leonard throughout an entire number,
but returns to the old name in a subsequent one.

Few authors require to be more on their
guard against mistakes than historians,
especially as they are peculiarly liable to
fall into them. What shall we think of
the authority of a school book when we
find the statement that Louis Napoleon
was Consul in 1853 before he became
Emperor of the French?

We must now pass from a book of small
value to an important work on the history
of England; but it will be necessary first to
make a few explanatory remarks. Our
readers know that English kings for several
centuries claimed the power of curing
scrofula, or king's evil; but they may not be
so well acquainted with the fact that the
French sovereigns were believed to enjoy
the same miraculous power. Such, however,
was the case; and tradition reported
that a phial filled with holy oil was sent
down from heaven to be used for the
anointing of the kings at their coronation.
We can illustrate this by an anecdote of
Napoleon. Lafayette and the first Consul
had a conversation one day on the government
of the United States. Bonaparte
did not agree with Lafayette's views, and
the latter told him that he was desirous of having the little phial broke over his head.'' This _sainte ampulle_, or holy vessel, was an important object in the ceremony, and the virtue of the oil was to confer the power of cure upon the anointed king. This the historian could not have known, or he would not have written:  The French were confident in themselves,
in their fortunes; in the special
gifts by which they held the stars.'' If
this were all the information that was
given us, we should be left in a perfect
state of bewilderment while trying to
understand how the French could hold
the stars, or, if they were able to hold
them, what good it would do them; but
the historian adds a note which, although
it contains some new blunders, gives the
clue to an explanation of an otherwise
inexplicable passage. It is as follows:
``The Cardinal of Lorraine showed Sir
William Pickering the precious ointment
of St. Ampull, wherewith the King of
France was sacred, which he said was sent
from heaven above a thousand years ago,
and since by miracle preserved, through
whose virtue also the king held les
estroilles.'' From this we might imagine
that the holy Ampulla was a person; but
the clue to the whole confusion is to be
found in the last word of the sentence.
As the French language does not contain
any such word as estroilles, there can be
no doubt that it stands for old French
escroilles, or the king's evil. The change
of a few letters has here made the mighty
difference between the power of curing
scrofula and the gift of holding the stars.

Explanation

**Detailed Explanation of the Excerpt from Literary Blunders: A Chapter in the "History of Human Error" by Henry B. Wheatley**

Henry B. Wheatley’s Literary Blunders (1893) is a humorous and scholarly examination of errors made by authors, editors, and historians—whether through carelessness, misinterpretation, or clerical mistakes. The excerpt provided highlights several types of blunders, ranging from misreadings of abbreviations to linguistic misunderstandings, all of which distort historical and literary accuracy. Below is a breakdown of the passage, focusing on its content, themes, literary devices, and significance.

1. Context of the Source

Wheatley (1838–1917) was a British bibliographer and editor, best known for his work on Samuel Pepys’ diary and his interest in historical inaccuracies. Literary Blunders is part of a broader 19th-century tradition of scholarly humor that exposed the fallibility of even the most respected writers. The book serves as both a cautionary tale for researchers and a source of amusement for readers who enjoy spotting errors in otherwise authoritative texts.

The excerpt critiques:

Misinterpretations of abbreviations (e.g., Pope’s note on Measure for Measure).
Clerical errors (e.g., Dickens’ temporary renaming of a character).
Historical misunderstandings (e.g., the confusion over the French king’s "power to hold the stars").
Linguistic corruption (e.g., escroilles becoming estroilles).

Wheatley’s tone is wry and pedagogical, emphasizing how easily errors can propagate when authors fail to verify their sources.

2. Breakdown of the Excerpt

A. Errors from Misreading Abbreviations (Pope and Warburton)

"Pope, in a note on Measure for Measure, informs us that the story was taken from Cinthio's novel Dec. 8 Nov. 5, thus contracting the words decade and novel. Warburton, in his edition of Shakespeare, was misled by these contractions, and fills them up as December 8 and November 5."

Explanation:
- Alexander Pope, in his notes on Shakespeare’s Measure for Measure, cited the source as Dec. 8 Nov. 5, abbreviating "Decade" (a collection of 100 novels by Cinthio, an Italian writer) and "Novel" (short story).
- William Warburton, a later editor, misread these as dates (December 8 and November 5), turning a bibliographic reference into a nonsensical chronological claim.
Significance:
- Demonstrates how abbreviations can be ambiguous if not clearly defined.
- Shows how editorial errors can distort scholarly work for generations.
Literary Device:
- Irony: Warburton, an esteemed scholar, makes a basic mistake by assuming the abbreviations refer to dates rather than textual references.

B. Clerical Errors from "Association of Ideas" (Alison and Dickens)

"Sir Archibald Alison, when describing the funeral of the Duke of Wellington in St. Paul's, speaks of one of the pall-bearers as Sir Peregrine Pickle, instead of Sir Peregrine Maitland. Dickens, in Bleak House, calls Harold Skimpole Leonard throughout an entire number, but returns to the old name in a subsequent one."

Explanation:
- Sir Archibald Alison (a historian) confused Sir Peregrine Maitland (a real military figure) with Sir Peregrine Pickle, the protagonist of Tobias Smollett’s picaresque novel The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle (1751). This is a Freudian slip—Alison’s mind associated the name "Peregrine" with the fictional character.
- Charles Dickens temporarily renamed Harold Skimpole as "Leonard" in a serial installment of Bleak House, likely due to a memory lapse or typesetting error, before correcting it later.
Significance:
- Highlights how famous authors are not immune to careless mistakes.
- Shows how serial publication (common in the 19th century) increased the risk of inconsistencies.
Literary Device:
- Juxtaposition: Placing a historian’s blunder next to a novelist’s, suggesting that even non-fiction writers are prone to imaginative errors.

C. Historical Inaccuracies (Louis Napoleon’s Timeline)

"What shall we think of the authority of a school book when we find the statement that Louis Napoleon was Consul in 1853 before he became Emperor of the French?"

Explanation:
- Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte (later Napoleon III) was First Consul of France (1848–1852) before declaring himself Emperor (1852–1870). The error lies in the incorrect date (1853), which misrepresents the sequence of events.
Significance:
- Critiques poor fact-checking in educational materials, which can mislead students.
- Reinforces the idea that historical errors undermine credibility.
Literary Device:
- Rhetorical question: "What shall we think..." invites the reader to judge the incompetence of the source.

D. The "King’s Evil" and Linguistic Corruption (French Royal Myth vs. Misinterpretation)

"The French were confident in themselves, in their fortunes; in the special gifts by which they held the stars... The Cardinal of Lorraine showed Sir William Pickering the precious ointment of St. Ampull, wherewith the King of France was sacred... through whose virtue also the king held les estroilles."

Explanation:
- Historical Context:
  - Medieval French and English kings were believed to have the divine power to cure scrofula (a tuberculosis-related disease) through touch, known as the "king’s evil."
  - The holy ampulla (sainte ampoule) was a vial of oil, allegedly sent from heaven, used in coronations to grant this healing power.
- The Blunder:
  - A historian misread escroilles (Old French for scrofula) as estroilles (stars), leading to the absurd claim that the French king could "hold the stars."
  - The error likely stemmed from:
    - Poor handwriting in manuscripts.
    - Linguistic evolution (Old French escroilles was unfamiliar to later readers).
    - Misinterpretation of a note where les estroilles was a corruption of les écrouelles (scrofula).
- Napoleon Anecdote:
  - Lafayette, disagreeing with Bonaparte, joked that he wanted the "little phial broke over his head"—a sarcastic reference to the ampulla’s supposed divine authority.
Significance:
- Shows how a single misread word can drastically alter historical meaning.
- Illustrates the danger of relying on secondary sources without verifying original texts.
- Highlights the superstitious beliefs surrounding monarchy in pre-modern Europe.
Literary Devices:
- Bathos: The shift from the grand idea of "holding the stars" to the mundane reality of curing a disease.
- Dramatic irony: The reader knows the correct meaning (scrofula), while the historian remains clueless.

3. Major Themes in the Excerpt

Human Fallibility in Scholarship:
- Even great minds (Pope, Warburton, Dickens) make errors due to haste, assumption, or distraction.
The Dangers of Unverified Sources:
- Misinterpretations (like Warburton’s dates or the escroilles/estroilles mix-up) show how errors compound over time.
The Power of Language and Misreading:
- A single misplaced letter or abbreviation can lead to centuries of confusion.
Historical Superstition vs. Rational Inquiry:
- The "king’s evil" myth contrasts with Wheatley’s skeptical, evidence-based approach.
The Role of Editors and Historians:
- Wheatley implies that scholars have a duty to fact-check, lest they perpetuate myths.

4. Literary Devices Used

Device	Example	Effect
Irony	Warburton’s misreading of Pope’s note	Highlights the absurdity of scholarly errors.
Juxtaposition	Alison’s historical blunder vs. Dickens’ fictional one	Shows that errors span genres.
Rhetorical Question	"What shall we think of the authority of a school book..."	Engages the reader in judging the error.
Bathos	From "holding the stars" to curing scrofula	Creates a comedic deflation of grandeur.
Anecdote	Napoleon and Lafayette’s exchange	Adds historical color and context.
Dramatic Irony	The historian’s confusion over estroilles	The reader knows the truth; the historian does not.

5. Significance of the Excerpt

For Literary and Historical Studies:
- Serves as a warning against over-reliance on secondary sources.
- Demonstrates how textual corruption (via misreadings, translations, or typos) shapes history.
For Writers and Editors:
- A humorous yet serious reminder to double-check facts, names, and references.
For Readers:
- Encourages critical reading—questioning even authoritative texts.
Cultural Insight:
- Reveals 19th-century attitudes toward history—a mix of reverence for the past and skepticism toward its recording.

6. Conclusion: Why This Matters

Wheatley’s excerpt is more than a collection of amusing mistakes; it is a meta-commentary on the construction of knowledge. Errors like these show how:

Language evolves (escroilles → estroilles), leading to misunderstandings.
Authority is fragile—even Shakespearean editors and famous novelists get things wrong.
History is shaped by accidents—a misplaced letter can turn a medical claim into an astrological one.

Ultimately, Literary Blunders reminds us that truth is often a matter of careful reading—and that the past is full of hilarious, humbling mistakes waiting to be uncovered.

Questions

Question 1

The passage’s discussion of Warburton’s misinterpretation of Pope’s note on Measure for Measure serves primarily to illustrate which of the following broader principles about textual scholarship?

A. The inevitability of editorial errors in pre-modern literary criticism due to the lack of standardized bibliographic conventions.
B. The tendency of later scholars to impose anachronistic frameworks onto earlier texts, thereby distorting their original meaning.
C. The ways in which ideological biases can lead editors to deliberately alter source material to fit their interpretive agendas.
D. The fundamental incompatibility between creative literature and rigorous historical documentation.
E. The cascading consequences of unchecked assumptions, whereby a single misreading can propagate through subsequent scholarship.

Question 2

The author’s inclusion of the anecdote about Lafayette’s remark to Napoleon—“he was desirous of having the little phial broke over his head”—functions most effectively as:

A. a satirical jab at Napoleon’s perceived arrogance, aligning the passage with broader 19th-century anti-Bonapartist sentiment.
B. an example of how political rhetoric often appropriates religious symbolism to undermine opponents’ legitimacy.
C. a transitional device to shift the focus from British to French historical errors, thereby broadening the passage’s scope.
D. a wry illustration of how even contemporary figures could recognize the absurdity of the “king’s evil” myth, underscoring the passage’s critique of credulity.
E. an attempt to humanize Lafayette by portraying him as a skeptic of monarchical superstition, contrasting with the historian’s gullibility.

Question 3

The passage’s treatment of the escroilles/estroilles confusion suggests that the historian’s error stems most fundamentally from:

A. a deliberate attempt to aggrandize the French monarchy by attributing celestial powers to it.
B. an overreliance on oral tradition, which is inherently more susceptible to corruption than written records.
C. the inherent ambiguity of Old French, a language whose archaic terms defy precise modern translation.
D. a failure to recognize that the corruption of a single word could radically alter the perceived meaning of a historical claim.
E. the lack of access to primary sources, forcing the historian to depend on secondhand accounts riddled with inaccuracies.

Question 4

Which of the following best describes the relationship between the passage’s tone and its underlying argument about historical accuracy?

A. The tone is one of amused detachment, which paradoxically reinforces the seriousness of the argument by highlighting the absurdity of the errors described.
B. The tone is overtly didactic, with the humor serving as a rhetorical device to soften the passage’s condemnation of scholarly laziness.
C. The tone is cynical and dismissive, undermining the passage’s own credibility by trivializing the errors it critiques.
D. The tone is nostalgic, lamenting the loss of a time when historians could make grand claims without fear of fact-checking.
E. The tone is polemical, using humor as a Trojan horse to smuggle in a broader indictment of the entire discipline of history.

Question 5

The structural progression of the passage—from Pope’s misread abbreviations to the escroilles/estroilles corruption—is most effectively understood as:

A. a chronological survey of increasingly egregious historical errors, culminating in the most absurd example.
B. a shift from trivial clerical mistakes to errors with profound theological and political implications.
C. an argument for the superiority of British scholarship over French historiography, as evidenced by the latter’s superstitions.
D. a demonstration of how errors in literary texts (e.g., Shakespeare, Dickens) are less consequential than those in historical records.
E. a layered exploration of how different types of misreading—linguistic, bibliographic, and contextual—can all distort the record in distinct but equally revealing ways.

Solutions and Explanations

1) Correct answer: E

Why E is most correct: The passage emphasizes how Warburton’s misreading of Pope’s abbreviated note (Dec. 8 Nov. 5 as dates rather than Decade 8, Novel 5) led to a chain of incorrect interpretations. This aligns with E’s focus on the cascading consequences of unchecked assumptions, where a single error (misinterpreting abbreviations) propagates through later scholarship. The passage does not blame systemic issues (A), ideological bias (C), or genre incompatibility (D), but rather the domino effect of a small, initial misstep.