CHAPTER IV

JONATHAN HARKER’S JOURNAL

31 May.—This morning when I woke I thought I would provide myself with some paper and envelopes from my bag and keep them in my pocket, so that I might write in case I should get an opportunity, but again a surprise, again a shock!

Every scrap of paper was gone, and with it all my notes, my memoranda, relating to railways and travel, my letter of credit, in fact all that might be useful to me were I once outside the castle. I sat and pondered awhile, and then some thought occurred to me, and I made search of my portmanteau and in the wardrobe where I had placed my clothes.

The suit in which I had travelled was gone, and also my overcoat and rug; I could find no trace of them anywhere. This looked like some new scheme of villainy…

  • troglodyte_mignon@lemmy.worldEnglish
    1·
    15 days ago

    It’s always funny, as a French person, to see old french words still used in English

    The one I love is “dandelion”. I’ve heard that it’s still sometimes called dent-de-lion in some French regions?

    • Œil@jlai.luEnglish
      1·
      14 days ago

      I actually discovered this one while trying to read Watership down in English. Although it’s a children’s novel, I found it much more difficult to read than Dracula because of the nature-related lexical field.

      Dent-de-lion is also used in italian (dente di leone), catalan (dent de lleó), spanish (diente de león), portuguese (dente-de-leão), en welsh (dant y llew), german (Löwenzahn), espéranto (leontodo), danish (løvetand), romanian (dintele leului), cornish, (dans-lew), norwegian (løvetann), and dutch (leeuwentand).

      Dent-de-lion is more poetic than its common form “pissenlit” (piss in bed), used because of its diuretics properties. 😅

      In France, I’ve never heard anyone use another term besides pissenlit. But, Wikipedia says that it’s sometimes called liondent, cramaillot in Franche-Comté, baraban in Saint-Étienne or cramias in Romandy (Suisse romande).

      • troglodyte_mignon@lemmy.worldEnglish
        2·
        14 days ago

        Plants tend to have so many names, it’s confusing. Pissenlit is a bit gross, but more informative than dent-de-lion, I guess. It seems that they’re sometimes called pissabed or piss-the-bed in English, but I suspect that most English speakers wouldn’t understand if I used that word? If I ever end up visiting London again, I’ll try to place it in a sentence as a challenge. 😈

        Trévoux’s dictionary says:

        Plante qui a pris ce nom de la découpure de ses feuilles, qu’on dit avoir quelque rapport avec l’arrangement & la disposition des dents du lion ; c’est sur tout dans l’espèce la plus ordinaire qu’on trouve cette prétendue convenance.

        … I’ve just looked at many pictures of lions’ dentitions, and I really can’t see a likeness. The author doesn’t seem really convinced either, ha ha.

        Le vulgaire appelle cette plante le pissenlit.

        :-)