War of Words
A king sent a message to the ruler of a neighbouring country. The message read: "Send me a blue diamond as large as a pigeon's egg or else..."The king on getting the message wrote back:"We don't have such a diamond and if we had..."The first king got very angry and declared war on his neighbour. The fighting went on for several months till a third king arranged a meeting between the two warring rulers. So they met and the first king said to the other: "What did you mean when you said, 'Send me a blue diamond as large as a pigeon's egg or else...'?""Why," he replied, "I meant a blue diamond as large as a pigeon's egg or else... some other diamond. I love diamonds. But what did you mean when you said, 'We don't have such a diamond and if we had-'?""It is easy to guess my meaning," said the other man. "What I wanted to say was, if we had such a diamond we would have gladly sent it to you."The Kings pledged to write more clearly in future communications and embraced and made peace.
Hope you like it!
PS: Some of you've asked me for extra practice, you can find some exercises here:
http://www.englishgrammarsecrets.com
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