A cursory study of Mr. Eric Partridge's most interesting "Usage
and Abusage " has perhaps made me hypercritical (a reprehensible fault) ; or perhaps it has quickened my perception of strange English. At any rate, I observed on Sunday (in the Sunday Express) ". . . the bequest of their last squire, Sir Henry Hoare, who with his wife died within six hours of each other," and on Monday (in the Manchester Guardian) "The Cambridge crew got too far ahead of the launches to _ . distinguish Individual form."
Mr. Partridge, I feel certain, would observe that Sir Henry and his wife could not have died within six hours of each other, and that the second sentence as it stands means that the Cambridge crew got too far ahead for it—the crew—to distinguish individual form. But, after all, do these things matter? On the whole they do. Once start disregarding the rules and there is no knowing where you may end.
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