Note 11 — II PREDECESSORS
Reading edition
There are some people who think they sufficiently acquit themselves, and entertain their company, with relating facts of no consequence, but at all out of the road of such common incidents as happen every day; and this I have observed more frequently among the Scots than any other nation, who are very careful not to omit the minutest circumstances of time or place; which kind of discourse, if it were not a little relieved by the uncouth terms and phrases, as well as accent and gesture peculiar to that country, would be hardly tolerable.—Jonathan Swift, Hints towards an Essay on Conversation.