Jasper County Democrat, Volume 8, Number 51, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 24 March 1906 — “What Is Propriety Pink?” [ARTICLE]

“What Is Propriety Pink?”

The question. Why is propriety pink ? is fallacious. Such expressions as “the pink of propriety” and “the pink of perfection” have really nothing to do with color at all, but descend from Mercutio’s “very pink of courtesy,” which is at once explained by Romeo as “pink for flower.” Romeo’s explanation is either correct or a silly Shakespearean pun, “pink” really standing for culminating “point”— acme. In either case color does not come into the matter. The flowe “pink” is no): named after the color, but vice versa—contrariwise to the ease of “carnation,” in which the fleshy color has given its name to the flower. A “pink” is so named either becaust the flower is “pinked,” needlework or a punctured duelist is, or because it resembles an eyelet—the “pink eyne” of “plumpe Bacchus” in “Antony and Cleopatra”—meaning not pink colored eyes, but eyes half shut, brought to a “point.” “Pic,” a peak or point, la the common Celtic ancestor of the various “pinks."—Spectator.