Note 530 — Chapter XV · [1841-1843.]

Cardinal Wiseman told me of a priest who, after having lived for twenty years in France, was mortified to find himself discovered as an Englishman, by the way in which he said “ah!” in expression of his acknowledgment of an answer given to him by a person to whom he addressed a question in a crowd. This may explain an anecdote in Moore’s Diary, which he could not himself understand. A lady was coming in to dinner, and, on her passing through the ante-room, where Talleyrand was standing, he looked up and exclaimed insignificantly “ah!” In the course of the dinner, the lady, having asked him across the table why he had uttered the exclamation of “oh”! on her entrance, Talleyrand, with a grave self-vindicatory look, answered; Madame, je n’ai pas dit oh! j’ai dit ah, (Memoirs VII., p. 5).

One of the standing jokes against the capuchins in Italy is about an “alphabet” which they are supposed to learn during the noviciate, and which consists exclusively of the interjection O!—which single sound, by the varieties of look, gesture, air, and expression which accompany it, is made to embody almost every conceivable meaning.

Much light is thrown on more than one obscure passage in the Latin classics by the gesticulations which still prevail in modern Italy, especially in Naples. See the Canon De Jorio’s extremely curious and learned book, “Mimica degli Antichi investigata nel Gestire Napolitano.”