You are on ze vood vay.

[Sibling DavidH]

Oh, you are heavy on wire today, not true?

[beagle]

Perhaps he has the cockroach.


F: Avoir le cafard

[Sibling DavidH]

There you have tapped on the thousand!

  _{F  'Taper dans le mille'  = 'hit the nail on the head'}

[beagle]

My French master used to complain that during the war the Brits would say "Look out!" when what they really meant was "Now would be a good time to curl up in a small ball".

[Sibling DavidH]

Well, m'dear fellow, stiff upper lip and all that, what?

[beagle]

Details were vague, but I think there was an incident involving being transported on the back of a truck and a low-hanging branch.

It was one of the memoirs in the "Tell us again how you won WWII all by yourself sir"*  series we'd attempt to set in train if we hadn't done our homework.



* see Nigel Molesworth, the brilliant creator of this distraction method.

[Sibling DavidH]

Molesworth is uterly wet and a weed, chiz chiz.


EDIT:

[beagle]

 

Hello clouds, hello sky.

Incidentally, talking about ancient literature, did you ever read the "Let's Parler Franglais" articles of Miles Kington in Punch or the spin-off books?

Highly recommended to give you that little extra linguistic I don't know what when conversing with the French.  His other articles could be fun too. e.g. "The Lord thy God is a little inclined to fly off the handle" etc.

"Il n'y a pas un 12:02 a Stainforth, il est withdrawn a cause de staff problems."

[Sibling DavidH]

Yes, I did see them, and I used to be annoyed because I was doing it long before.  But the idea must be as old as the hills frogs.   

[Swatopluk]

In the story The Last Term Kipling did a bit of vood way too.

McTurk drew off with Stalky to prowl about the office. They left little unturned.

"Come here a shake, Beetle. What's this thing?" aid Stalky, in a few minutes. "Looks familiar."

Said Beetle, after a glance: "It's King's Latin prose exam. paper. In—In Varrem: actio prima. What a lark!"

"Think o' the pure-souled, high-minded boys who'd give their eyes for a squint at it!" said McTurk.

"No, Willie dear," said Stalky; "that would be wrong and painful to our kind teachers. You wouldn't crib, Willie, would you?"

"Can't read the beastly stuff, anyhow," was the reply. "Besides, we're leavin' at the end o' the term, so it makes no difference to us."

"'Member what the Considerate Bloomer did to Spraggon's account of the Puffin'ton Hounds? We must sugar Mr. King's milk for him," said Stalky, all lighted from within by a devilish joy. "Let's see what Beetle can do with those forceps he's so proud of."

"Don't see now you can make Latin prose much more cock-eye than it is, but we'll try," said Beetle, transposing an aliud and Asiae from two sentences. "Let's see! We'll put that full-stop a little further on, and begin the sentence with the next capital. Hurrah! Here's three lines that can move up all in a lump."

"'One of those scientific rests for which this eminent huntsman is so justly celebrated.'" Stalky knew the Puffington run by heart.

"Hold on! Here's a vol—voluntate quidnam all by itself," said McTurk.

"I'll attend to her in a shake. Quidnam goes after Dolabella."

"Good old Dolabella," murmured Stalky. "Don't break him. Vile prose Cicero wrote, didn't he? He ought to be grateful for—"

"Hullo!" said McTurk, over another forme. "What price a giddy ode? Qui—quis—oh, it's Quis multa gracilis, o' course."

"Bring it along. We've sugared the milk here," said Stalky, after a few minutes' zealous toil. "Never thrash your hounds unnecessarily."

"Quis munditiis? I swear that's not bad," began Beetle, plying the tweezers. "Don't that interrogation look pretty? Heu quoties fidem! That sounds as if the chap were anxious an' excited. Cui flavam religas in rosa—Whose flavor is relegated to a rose. Mutatosque Deos flebit in antro."

"Mute gods weepin' in a cave," suggested Stalky. "'Pon my Sam, Horace needs as much lookin' after as—Tulke."

They edited him faithfully till it was too dark to see.

"'Aha! Elucescebat, quoth our friend.' Ulpian serves my need, does it? If King can make anything out of that, I'm a blue-eyed squatteroo," said Beetle, as they slid out of the loft window into a back alley of old acquaintance and started on a three-mile trot to the College. But the revision of the classics had detained them too long. They halted, blown and breathless, in the furze at the back of the gasometer, the College lights twinkling below, ten minutes at least late for tea and lock-up.