14 JANUARY 1978, Page 17

Misunderstanding

Sir: I enjoyed Talking turkey by Philip Hope-Wallace (24 December) and like him have always been baffled when, watching an American film, someone says 'take a rain check'. The misheard expressions of childhood are somehow better not solved, as Mr Hope-Wallace says. When the war started I, like some precious stained glass window, was sent away from the bombs and attended a junior school run by nuns. Saved for posterity, I was most puzzled when we used to pray to Lady Petrol Sucker. I knew that this couldn't be right but didn't like to ask. Twenty years' later I discovered that it was Our Lady of Perpetual Succour. I've never been quite the same since.

John Francis 3 The Broadway, Portswood, Southampton