[73]
I do
[p. 489]
not know that there is any reason why modesty
should prevent me from illustrating this point from
my own family. My father, in the course of a declamation against a man who had said he would die
on his embassy and then returned after a few days'
absence without accomplishing anything, said, non
exigo ut immoriaris legationi: immorare.1 For the
sense is forcible and the sound of the two words,
which are so very different in meaning, is pleasant,
more especially since the assonance is not far fetched,
but presents itself quite naturally, one word being of
the speaker's own selection, while the other is supplied by his opponent.
1 “I (do not demand that you should die on your embassy; only stay there!”
Quintilian. With An English Translation. Harold Edgeworth Butler. Cambridge. Cambridge, Mass., Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann, Ltd. 1922.
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