Grammar: Howlers 24

cut and dry (Cut and dried. In Lark Rise to Candleford, Flora Thompson talks of corn “cut and dried in the fields”. Painting by John Nash.)

forge a path, despite the effort of forging the tunnels (You forge a sword on an anvil; you beat a path, excavate a tunnel.)

Do Americans think that a “manse” is a mansion? It's a house lived in by a Presbyterian minister.

We recorded our 500th specie! (“Species” is both singular and plural. So is Homo sapiens. Aurochs is singular – the plural is aurochsen.)

Camilla is now a fully pledged member of the Royal family. (That's "fully fledged", like a young bird that has acquired adult feathers.) 

Oh dear, Biden and Harris want to bring in “mashell law”. (That's "martial law", but they haven't yet.)

I was at your beckon call. (Beck and call – beck means the same as beckon.)

white-bred Christian male (It’s “white-bread”, meaning “normal, standard, plain vanilla”.) 

Someone on Twitter used “rote tasks” to mean exercises like “fill in the missing word”. (Rote learning is learning by heart, but its meaning seems to have expanded. When people say “rote learning”, they probably don’t intend “memorising poetry, tables and the dates of the Kings and Queens of England”.)

Espouse for endorse (He publicly espoused her wonderfulness. You espouse – literally "marry" – a cause, but endorse a candidate. Confusingly, they could both be substituted by "support" in that context. You might approve a candidate, but adopt or embrace a cause. Avoiding French and Latin, you could uphold a cause, and back a candidate.)

claiming the high moral ground (It’s the "moral high ground”. Taking the high ground is important in a land battle. Once you’re on a rise or hill, you can see further, and you can push the enemy down the slope whereas he is forced into an uphill fight.)

Playing on your mind for preying on your mind. The metaphor of predator and prey passes most people by, and “playing” has almost overwritten “preying”. 

Manga Carta, Magma Carta (End Oct 2020. Apparently Magna Carta states that governments can’t impose lockdowns.)

Harbour sympathy for generate sympathy (If you harbour something you give it a refuge. Metaphorically you can “harbour” a grudge etc.)

Ironically, the tiles were not put back on the walls when the kitchen was refurbished. (What do people think it means?)

When did “jam-packed” become “ram-packed”? “Rammed” means stuffed or crowded. The jam in jam-packed is a traffic jam or log-jam.

The entire situation has cast a pallor over my pregnancy. (slate.com. A pall is a black, white or purple cloth you drape over a coffin. Pallor – paleness – is from the same root as “pale”, but the funeral pall is from pallium, a garment.)

Tears have flown on more than one occasion. (Standard.co.uk. The birds have flown, and tears have flowed.)

tidied over (It’ll keep me tided over – ie it’ll keep me going until the next high tide when I can go out and catch more fish.)

He held on to the tenants of his faith. (Tenets – "tenet" is Latin for "he holds".)

The anaesthetics of the oligarch's flat were surprisingly restrained. (aesthetics)

Ratifiers for ratafias, gobble-stitch for gobelin-stitch (Girls’ Own Annual, 1920)

More here, and links to the rest.