�Zigged before you Zagged�
This is an unusual expression, for a variety of different reasons.
For example, when in uniform, French
sailors never �Zig� before they �Zag�. Why?
Because their trousers are always Toolong and Tooloose.
Jacques Offenbach is a French composer whose music is very much liked
by British audiences. His most famous operetta
is: �Orpheus
in his Underpants�. My uncle has
a musical dog, and if his dog hears this Overture, he will often bark.
�In the Tales of Hoffman� there is a tenor aria. (The word �aria� is an Italian
word, and is the Third Person Interrogative Past Pluperfect Subjunctive of the
verb �to
be�, or �Are you?� in Modern English.)
This aria is �The Leg End of Kleinzach�. I don�t want to go too deeply into the
translation, for fear of offending anyone, but, in the German word �Kleinzach�,
you can see the two words �Klein� and �Zach�, (�Little�
and �Sack�). Delicacy prevents me explaining more!
Many quiz-masters have been misled by the name of a cigarette paper, �Zig-Zag�.
However, this is a specialty paper which requires the smoker to puff
smoke out, first from the left of the mouth, and then from the right of the
mouth, alternately, without pause. The
only individuals who can do this with any success are United States� District
Attorneys. In fact, for someone to
become a District Attorney, I think that he must be able to smoke like this
throughout the whole of Part I of the Entry Examination.
But of course, the phrase, �Zig Zag�, originates from the �Backward
Language�, originally developed by the Mohican Indians, famous as
shoe-makers, with their treatise on cobbling, (shoe-repairing): �The Last of the Mohicans!�
Incidentally, I have a friend who assures me that all Redskins are
descended from Geordies. When two tribes
meet on the hillside, the Leader calls: �Ah
knaa yee!� and his counterpart replies: �Ah knaa yee �n� aal�.
A well-known expression from this ancient Mohican backward language, used at the
English tea-table is: �Ass-p the ugar-sh, ease-pl�; which
every English school-child can translate: �Pass the sugar, please�.
Here, we have the final clue in the gaj-wis, the gij-was, the jig-saw!
�Giz the Gaz�, (�Give me the Gas�), is a typical
Tyneside expression for a family on a camping holiday, when someone wants to be
given the gas container. When it is said
in Backward Language, it becomes �Zag the Zig�, but if someone says
it incorrectly, it becomes �Zig the Zag�.
Hence, the person is accused: �You Zigged before you Zagged�.
Les
