Commas, Colons and Semi-colons
By gurujee
@gurujee (216)
India
March 10, 2012 7:21am CST
When I was at school, I used to think that punctuation marks were mere fripperies to writing that could be easily dispensed with. This I changed when I heard my teacher telling this incident to underline the importance of the use of comma.
During the time of the British rule in India, a native shot an English officer causing grievous injury. The native was duly arrested and was sentenced to death by hanging. The man submitted a mercy petition to the Governor of the Province with more skepticism than hope.
The Governor misplaced the file and could lay his hands on the petition only at the eleventh hour. As the time for the execution was drawing near, he could not send his reply by the usual courier. So he sent a telegram which read:
HANG HIM, NOT RELEASE HIM.
The man who received the message at the other end wrote the message to be handed over to the jailor. It read:
HANG HIM NOT, RELEASE HIM.
The prisoner was released and he lived a sin-free life thereafter owing his life to a comma.
Have you ever made a goof like this in your life as the man in the Posts & Telegraph Department did?
2 responses
@urbandekay (18278)
•
10 Mar 12
Do you believe this fanciful tale actually happened?
all the best urban
@sirnose (2436)
• United States
10 Mar 12
Yes, I have made grammar errors in my writings which are very annoying. This is why I try to read grammar books on how to write and proofread properly. In the case of the story you told the grammar error help the condemned prisoner in his time of need.
