Mea Culpa: Special delivery

Susanna Richards gathers up the editorial shortcomings in last week’s Independent and gently shushes them to sleep

Multiple births are not altogether uncommon, but the term does not generally refer to being born more than once (Getty )

We published a touching, though slightly peculiar, article on Christmas Day, in which we listed the names and weights of this year’s cohort of festive babies (if babies can ever really be described as such, unless they are adorned with tinsel). The headline we used was a herald of the confusion to follow, as it proudly declared: “Christmas miracle as twins born on different days after arriving weeks early.”

It appeared to indicate that there had indeed been some kind of miracle, or at least an anachronism in the usual order of proceedings, with the babies in question having “arrived” at some point before being born. The subheadline was equally baffling, though this was largely down to the order in which we had decided to present the information. “Both, with their mother, will stay in hospital for a few days, staff said, but hope to be out by Hogmanay,” we wrote.

Our sub-editors are conditioned to avoid the use of punctuation in page furniture, and especially its overuse; the inclusion of four commas can safely be called excessive. It almost felt like one of those puzzles in which the reader is required to rearrange a series of phrases into a coherent sentence. And I’m almost certain that no one had actually asked the poor wee tots when they were hoping to go home.