YOURS SINCERELY

New Zealand Tablet, Volume 19, 19 July 1906, Page 38

YOURS SINCERELY

. When you write to- your friend and sign yourself ' Yours sincerely,' you say, literally, " ' Yours without wax.' Here is the story about this strange twisting of words : A famous sculptor was just putting the finishing touches to the face of a statue which was to go to the Academy the next day, when he accidentally chipped off the end of the marble nose . Quick as thought, he carefully and cunningly made a tip of wax for the mutilated organ, trusting that the accident would never be detected. But there happened to be a sharp-eyed man en the committee and The sculptor lost the prize for which he had striven. Ever afterward it was a common saying, 'We wish the sculpture to be sine cera,' or ' without \\i.x' and "by degrees the term became applied to living men as well as to those made of marble.