beboots

Let it never be said that you can be completely bored in any one class. Even in the densest of texts, you occasional run across passages that grip your attention.
Here are a few of those things that I have run across recently in my studies.

In French translation, we’ve had some quick review of expressions and how to translate them. Some of you may already know expressions like “Never judge a book by its cover”, but you can’t translate them word for word in French. It won’t make sense. Instead, you say the equivalent of “Don’t judge a monk by his habit.” There are also ones like “practice makes perfect”: “C’est en forgeant que l’on deviant forgeron.” (literally, “it’s in forging that one becomes a blacksmith”, but it flows so much more smoothly over the tongue because the verb “forger” (to forge) and “forgeron” (blacksmith) have the same root word).

Speaking of expressions… I had no idea that the expression “to hem and haw” was so rare. Tell me, guys, have you heard of it before, and do you know what it means without having to look it up? I’ve argued with a few of my friends about it. ;) Some even say that it’s “hum and haw”, but I’m pretty sure “hem” is correct. What say you?

Now on to Civil War stuff. (Which is always the good stuff.)

“John Lincoln Clem (1852-1937) was reportedly nine year sold in June 1861 when he stowed away in a regimental baggage car and attached himself to the 22nd Michigan, whose officers appointed him the drummer for Company C. At the Battle of Shiloh a shell shattered his drum, earning him the sobriquet “Johnny Shiloh.” Clem became a mounted orderly on the staff of General George H. Thomas, and with the “rank” of lace sergeant. At the age of thirteen, he was discharged, only to return to the army as an officer in 1871. He retired as a major general at age sixty-five, and in 1916 was the last man then active in the service who had served in the Civil War.”
-Volo, Dorothy Denneen and James M. Volo, Daily Life in Civil War America, 131.

“The majority of muskets were fitted with a socket bayonet about eighteen inches long. Some regiments were issued short swords, instead of bayonets, that could be fitted to the barrel of the musket. Although great reliance was placed by military tacticians on the ability of “cold steel” to drive the enemy from the field, in practice very few combatants came to such close quarters before the psychological effect of the bayonet caused one side or the other to flee. Captain J.W. De Forest noted that “bayonet fighting occurs mainly in newspaper and other works of fiction.” Bayonets, however, proved to be excellent digging tools, skewers for roasting meat and potatoes, and good candle holders.”
-Volo, Dorothy Denneen and James M. Volo, Daily Life in Civil War America, 168-9.

“Of all the war escapades initiated by the Confederate cavalry, Genera Wade Hampton’s “Beef Steak Raid" most captures the imagination. Confederate food supply had become critical by t he fall of 1864. Hampton developed a well-timed and well-executed plan to capture a herd of cattle at the federal supply depot beyond General Lee’s lines. Striking at 3 A.M., Hampton’s men managed to rustle more than 2,400 head of cattle and re-enter Lee’s lines. No more welcome raiding party ever returned to camp. The Beef Steak Raid was as brilliant an operation as any completed in the war. Hampton had brought in more than 2 million pounds of beef, or enough to feed 50,000 men for 40 days. When told of the raid, Lincoln called it the slickest piece of cattle rustling he had ever seen.”
-Volo, Dorothy Denneen and James M. Volo, Daily Life in Civil War America, 150.

What have you guys been learning lately?