“单词背后的故事”是一个电台节目，通过讲故事和举例子，让英语学习者更系统地了解到英语习语的意思与用法。当然，要学以致用才能真正掌握这些习语哦。
Some of the most exciting information comes by way of the 1)grapevine.
That is so because reports received through the grapevine are supposed to be secret. The formation is all 2)hush hush. It is whispered into your ear with the understanding that you will not pass it on to others.
You feel honored and excited. You are one of the special few to get this information. You cannot wait. You must quickly find other ears to pour the information into. And so, the nformation—secret as it is—begins to spread. Nobody knows how far.
The expression “3)by the grapevine” is more than one hundred years old.
The American inventor Samuel F. Morse is largely responsible for the birth of the expression. Among others, he experimented with the idea of telegraphy—sending messages over a wire by electricity. When Morse finally completed his telegraphic instrument, he went before Congress[国会] to show that it worked. He sent a message over a wire from Washington to Baltimore. The message was: “What hath God wrought注?” This was on May 24th, 1844.
Quickly, companies began to build telegraph lines from one place to another. Men everywhere seemed to be putting up poles with strings of wire for carrying telegraphic messages. The workmanship was poor. And the wires were not put up straight.
Some of the results looked strange. People said they looked like a grapevine. A large number of the telegraph lines were going in all directions, as crooked[弯曲的] as the vines that grapes grow on. So was born the expression “by the grapevine.”
Some writers believe that the phrase would soon have disappeared were it not for the American Civil War.
Soon after the war began in 1861, military commanders started to send battlefield reports by telegraph. People began hearing the phrase “by the grapevine” to describe false as well as true reports from the battlefield. It was like a game. Was it true? Who says so?
Now, as in those far-off[久远的] Civil War days, getting information by the grapevine remains something of a game. A friend brings you a bit of strange news. “No,” you say, “it just can't be true! Who told you?” Comes the answer, “I got it by the grapevine.”
You really cannot know how much—if any—of the information that comes to you by the grapevine is true or false. Still, in the words of an old American saying, the person who keeps pulling the grapevine shakes down at least a few grapes.
Notes
1) grapevine n. 传闻，小道消息
2) hush-hush a. 秘密的，不公开的
3) by the grapevine 通过小道消息得知
注：这句话出自《希伯来圣经》的第四本书——《民数记》（Book of Numbers）第23章第23节，意思是：“上帝创造了什么？”