Spoonerisms

A common type of verbal blunder involves switching the initial sounds of a pair of words. The term "Spoonerism" is an eponym of the late Reverend William Archibald Spooner, who had a notorious penchant for this kind of error.

Attributed to Reverend Spooner:

• "Three cheers for our queer old dean!"

• "It is kisstomary to cuss the bride."

• "Those girls are sin twisters."

• "Is the bean dizzy?"

• "The Lord is a shoving leopard."

• "When the boys come back from France, we'll have the hags flung out."

• "Let me sew you to your sheet."

• "The enemy fled quickly from the ears and sparrows."

• "She joins this club over my bed doddy."

• "The old revival hymn, 'Shall We Rather At the Giver?'"

• "There is no peace in a home where a dinner swells."

• "I see before me tons of soil." -- A greeting to a group of farmers; he meant to say, "sons of toil."

• "We all know what it is to have a half-warmed fish inside us." -- A statement made when he meant to say, "Half-formed wish."

• "You have hissed my mystery lectures and were caught fighting a liar in the quad. Having tasted the whole worm, you will leave by the next town drain."