Yer a langer!

The following letter from John A Murphy was published in today’s Irish Times, under the heading “A good deal of a prig”. This prompted my response detailed below which, I suspect, Madam is unlikely to publish.

Madam, - For a mad moment there, watching the RTÉ interview with Dr Garret FitzGerald last Sunday week, I understood him to say he was "a good deal of a prick" in his younger days. And I thought, delightedly: what an endearing confession, what an admirable admission of human imperfection, and what an expression of the common touch.
Alas, how disappointed I was to learn from your Corrections column (August 29th) that all he had said was "prig". And how priggish and humourless it was of him to insist on the correction, and to remind us so huffily that "he would never use such language". - Yours, etc,
JOHN A MURPHY, Douglas Road, Cork.

My response:

Madam, - In his comments about Garret Fitzgerald, John A Murphy (letters 6th Sept) reveals himself to be "a good deal of a langer".
Regards etc.