Bite-sized portions

During one dinner, [Queen Elizabeth] sat next to a rather deaf and very dull admiral who regaled the Queen with naval stories, with especial reference to the condition of an old ship which had broken down. In an attempt to change the subject, the Queen enquired, "How is your dear sister?" -a question that the admiral obviously didn't hear, because he continued in the same naval vein, saying "She'll be alright when we've turned her over and scraped the barnacles off her bottom." The Queen's shoulders shook helplessly with laughter as she buried her face in her napkin.

Educationalists often deplore the use of abbreviated or slang words, and one of the most common used is Xmas, in place of Christmas. Wicked atheists have been blamed for using an X in the place of the word Christ, and thus "taking the Christ out of Christmas." In fact, the reverse is true. The X has been used by theologians for hundreds of years to denote the Greek letter chi, the first letter in the Greek spelling of Christ. The X represents Christ and the cross upon which he was crucified.

Punishment for sexual misconduct in 17th-century America was strict, with fines or imprisonment for adulterers and fornicators, and worse for convicted rapists. However, one cannot help feeling a little sorry for the joker Ralph Earle, who was fined 20 shillings in October 1663 for "drawing his wife in an uncivil manner on the snow."

Courtesy of: History Bites by Judith Millidge.