Judge Gets Tangled Up on Quotation
“Ah, what a wondrous web we weave, when first we commence to deceive.” So said Orange County Superior Court Judge Ragnar R. Engebretsen as a defendant was being arrested (Times, Aug. 13).
Close, but no cigar. The judge was obviously trying to recall a famous quotation from Sir Water Scott’s “Marmion”: “Oh, what a tangled web we weave/When first we practice to deceive.”
As a former teacher of English, I give him an A for effort and a D for execution.
TED JOHNSON
Costa Mesa
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