The wrath of Nicola Sturgeon

I can’t seem to find the Oracle of Delphi’s complete works. The libraries remain shut and when I go to Google I find the search engine inadequate in the matter of the ‘Complete Pythia’. So I throw the following story out there unsourced in the sure and certain knowledge that next week’s letters page looks set to be a bloodbath for me. Spectator readers are among the most learned readers around, and I know my fate if I relay any of this inaccurately. Nevertheless, here we go.

Several years ago an utterance I’m pretty sure came from the Delphic Oracle lodged in my head. A foreign king (I hear you tapping ‘Dear Sir’ as I type) wanted to know whether he should go across the river and invade a neighbouring kingdom. The Oracle, whose utterances were famously ambiguous — not to say Delphic — proclaimed: ‘If the king crosses the river, a mighty realm will he destroy.’