Running for the Presidency
SIR,—One is grateful to your correspondent for reminding us that Calvin Coolidge "did not choose to run," not "did not choose to stand" for the Presidency in 1928. Yet, though there can be no doubt that Calvin Coolidge meant exactly what he said, "do not choose" is an unequi- vocal negative in standard English as well as in "the New England vernacular." Surely it was a British, not a Yankee, oyster of whom Lewis Carroll wrote: " The eldest Oyster looked at him, But never a word he said: The eldest Oyster winked his eye,
And shook his heavy head—
Meaning to say he did not choose To leave the oyster-bed."
Here, I grant, are the Yankee taciturnity, the Yankee wink and the Yankee shrewdness—for of course the eldest Oyster had no intention of being lured away and eaten—but I am sure no commentator has ever placed the scene of "The Walrus and the Carpenter" on the Massachusetts coast.—Yours faithfully, CARL NIEMEYER.
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