Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 8.djvu/434

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HERE has not, as yet, been any second part of this work published, nor do I believe was ever intended. But my friend Anthony Hammond, esq., upon reading it over, sent me examples to three more rules of his own making, viz.

Rule 35. The Rule of Blunder is, when any one under the notion of a mistake, makes a pun which he may take notice of himself if the company do not; ex. gr.

Captain J said to his kinsman, who was going to be married, "O, cousin, I hear you are about to halter your condition." The company not taking notice of it; the captain corrected himself, "alter," says he, "I should have said."

Rule 36. The Rule of Sound is when the pun consists in the sound of the words only, without any relation to the thing signified; ex. gr.

He who translated that ingenious posy of a wedding ring, "Qui dedit, se dedit;" when "he did it, she did it."

Or, like that of the country parson, whom a Roundhead colonel thought to puzzle by asking him whether he could rhyme to "hydrops, corax,