'Yours Sincerely.'

New Zealand Tablet, Volume XXIX, Issue 40, 3 October 1901, Page 29

' Yours Sincerely.'

The jerry builders who construct residences, part of whioh tumbles into one's soup, and the floors of which unexpectedly drop into the oellar, would not be so ready to subscribe themselves ' Yours Sinoerely ' if they knew the origin of the phrase. The Stone Trade* Journal gives the origin of the words, which to students is old, but whioh may be new to the gentry who profess to provide shelter for a great part of the community in the big cities of the world : — ' The extent to whioh marble is entering into the decoration of modern buildings is but a repetition of the Roman architecture. The fact is that the old Roman jerry builders used defective slabs of marble in erecting residences to sell at reduoed lates. and covered the defects with a oement of whioh white wax formed the chief in* gredient. They looked just as stately as the others, till an exceptionally hot sun melted the wax and revealed the fraud, Hence a perfect building was said to be " sine oera," or " without wax," and a friendship perfected by the trial of adversity was said to be " without wax.' 1 The signature " sine oera," as a symbol of genuine affection and probity, has been used ever since, and is perpetuated in the English word " sincerity." '