From the coals that he'd preferred to the advantages of truth. He cast his
eyes about him and above him; then he wrote On a slab of thin asbestos
what I venture here to quote -- For I read it in the rose-light of the
everlasting glow: "Cloudy; variable winds, with local showers; cooler;
snow."
Halcyon Jones
WEDDING, n.A ceremony at which two persons undertake to
become one,one undertakes to become nothing, and nothing undertakes to
becomesupportable.
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WEREWOLF, n.A wolf that was once, or is sometimes, a
man.Allwerewolves are of evil disposition, having assumed a bestial form
togratify a beastial appetite, but some, transformed by sorcery, are
ashumane and is consistent with an acquired taste for human flesh. Some
Bavarian peasants having caught a wolf one evening, tied itto a post by the
tail and went to bed.The next morning nothing wasthere!Greatly perplexed,
they consulted the local priest, who toldthem that their captive was
undoubtedly a werewolf and had resumed itshuman for during the
night."The next time that you take a wolf," thegood man said, "see that
you chain it by the leg, and in the morningyou will find a Lutheran."
WHANGDEPOOTENAWAH, n.In the Ojibwa tongue, disaster; an
unexpectedaffliction that strikes hard.
Should you ask me whence this laughter, Whence this audible bigsmiling, With its labial extension, With its maxillar distortion And its
diaphragmic rhythmus Like the billowing of an ocean, Like the shaking of
a carpet, I should answer, I should tell you: From the great deeps of the
spirit, From the unplummeted abysmus Of the soul this laughter welleth
As the fountain, the gug-guggle, Like the river from the canon [sic], To
entoken and give warning That my present mood is sunny. Should you ask
me further question -- Why the great deeps of the spirit, Why the
unplummeted abysmus Of the soule extrudes this laughter, This all audible
big-smiling, I should answer, I should tell you With a white heart,
tumpitumpy, With a true tongue, honest Injun: William Bryan, he has
Caught It, Caught the Whangdepootenawah!
Is't the sandhill crane, the shankank, Standing in the marsh, the
kneedeep, Standing silent in the kneedeep With his wing-tips crossed
behind him And his neck close-reefed before him, With his bill, his
william, buried In the down upon his bosom, With his head retracted inly,
While his shoulders overlook it? Does the sandhill crane, the shankank,
Shiver grayly in the north wind, Wishing he had died when little, As the
sparrow, the chipchip, does? No 'tis not the Shankank standing, Standing
in the gray and dismal Marsh, the gray and dismal kneedeep. No, 'tis
peerless William Bryan Realizing that he's Caught It, Caught the
Whangdepootenawah!
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WHEAT, n.A cereal from which a tolerably good whisky can with
somedifficulty be made, and which is used also for bread.The French
aresaid to eat more bread _per capita_ of population than any otherpeople,
which is natural, for only they know how to make the stuffpalatable.
WHITE, adj. and n.Black.
WIDOW, n.A pathetic figure that the Christian world has agreed totake
humorously, although Christ's tenderness towards widows was oneof the
most marked features of his character.
WINE, n.Fermented grape-juice known to the Women's Christian
Unionas "liquor," sometimes as "rum."Wine, madam, is God's next best
giftto man.
WIT, n.The salt with which the American humorist spoils
hisintellectual cookery by leaving it out.WITCH, n.(1)Any ugly and
repulsive old woman, in a wicked leaguewith the devil.(2)A beautiful and
attractive young woman, inwickedness a league beyond the devil.
WITTICISM, n.A sharp and clever remark, usually quoted, and
seldomnoted; what the Philistine is pleased to call a "joke."
WOMAN, n.
An animal usually living in the vicinity of Man, and having
arudimentary susceptibility to domestication.It is credited bymany of the
elder zoologists with a certain vestigial docilityacquired in a former state
of seclusion, but naturalists of thepostsusananthony period, having no
knowledge of the seclusion,deny the virtue and declare that such as
creation's dawn beheld,it roareth now.The species is the most widely
distributed of allbeasts of prey, infesting all habitable parts of the globe,
fromGreeland's spicy mountains to India's moral strand.The popularname
(wolfman) is incorrect, for the creature is of the cat kind. The woman is
lithe and graceful in its movement, especially theAmerican variety (_felis
pugnans_), is omnivorous and can betaught not to talk.
Balthasar Pober
WORMS'-MEAT, n.The finished product of which we are the
rawmaterial.The contents of the Taj Mahal, the Tombeau Napoleon and
theGranitarium.Worms'-meat is usually outlasted by the structure
thathouses it, but "this too must pass away."Probably the silliest workin
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which a human being can engage is construction of a tomb forhimself.The
solemn purpose cannot dignify, but only accentuates bycontrast the
foreknown futility.
Ambitious fool! so mad to be a show! How profitless the labor you
bestow Upon a dwelling whose magnificence The tenant neither can
admire nor know.
Build deep, build high, build massive as you can, The wanton grassroots will defeat the plan By shouldering asunder all the stones In what to
you would be a moment's span.
Time to the dead so all unreckoned flies That when your marble is all
dust, arise, If wakened, stretch your limbs and yawn --You'll think you
scarcely can have closed your eyes.
What though of all man's works your tomb alone Should stand till
Time himself be overthrown? Would it advantage you to dwell therein
Forever as a stain upon a stone?
Joel Huck
WORSHIP, n.Homo Creator's testimony to the sound construction
andfine finish of Deus Creatus.A popular form of abjection, having
anelement of pride.
WRATH, n.Anger of a superior quality and degree, appropriate
toexalted characters and momentous occasions; as, "the wrath of
God,""the day of wrath," etc.Amongst the ancients the wrath of kings
wasdeemed sacred, for it could usually command the agency of some god
forits fit manifestation, as could also that of a priest.The Greeksbefore
Troy were so harried by Apollo that they jumped out of thefrying-pan of
the wrath of Cryses into the fire of the wrath ofAchilles, though
Agamemnon, the sole offender, was neither fried norroasted.A similar
noted immunity was that of David when he incurredthe wrath of Yahveh
by numbering his people, seventy thousand of whompaid the penalty with
their lives.God is now Love, and a director ofthe census performs his work
without apprehension of disaster.
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X
X in our alphabet being a needless letter has an added invincibilityto
the attacks of the spelling reformers, and like them, willdoubtless last as
long as the language.X is the sacred symbol of tendollars, and in such
words as Xmas, Xn, etc., stands for Christ, not,as is popular supposed,
because it represents a cross, but because thecorresponding letter in the
Greek alphabet is the initial of his name-- _Xristos_.If it represented a
cross it would stand for St.Andrew, who "testified" upon one of that
shape.In the algebra ofpsychology x stands for Woman's mind.Words
beginning with X areGrecian and will not be defined in this standard
English dictionary.
Y
YANKEE, n.In Europe, an American.In the Northern States of
ourUnion, a New Englander.In the Southern States the word is unknown.
(See DAMNYANK.)
YEAR, n.A period of three hundred and sixty-five disappointments.
YESTERDAY, n.The infancy of youth, the youth of manhood, the
entirepast of age. But yesterday I should have thought me blest To stand
high-pinnacled upon the peak Of middle life and look adown the bleak
And unfamiliar foreslope to the West, Where solemn shadows all the land
invest And stilly voices, half-remembered, speak Unfinished prophecy,
and witch-fires freak The haunted twilight of the Dark of Rest. Yea,
yesterday my soul was all aflame To stay the shadow on the dial's face At
manhood's noonmark!Now, in God His name I chide aloud the little
interspace Disparting me from Certitude, and fain Would know the dream
and vision ne'er again.
Baruch Arnegriff
It is said that in his last illness the poet Arnegriff wasattended at
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different times by seven doctors.
YOKE, n.An implement, madam, to whose Latin name, _jugum_, we
oweone of the most illuminating words in our language -- a word
thatdefines the matrimonial situation with precision, point and poignancy.
A thousand apologies for withholding it.
YOUTH, n.The Period of Possibility, when Archimedes finds a
fulcrum,Cassandra has a following and seven cities compete for the honor
ofendowing a living Homer.
Youth is the true Saturnian Reign, the Golden Age on earthagain, when
figs are grown on thistles, and pigs betailed withwhistles and, wearing
silken bristles, live ever in clover, andclows fly over, delivering milk at
every door, and Justice neveris heard to snore, and every assassin is made
a ghost and,howling, is cast into Baltimost!
Polydore Smith
Z
ZANY, n.A popular character in old Italian plays, who imitated
withludicrous incompetence the _buffone_, or clown, and was therefore
theape of an ape; for the clown himself imitated the serious charactersof
the play.The zany was progenitor to the specialist in humor, aswe to-day
have the unhappiness to know him.In the zany we see anexample of
creation; in the humorist, of transmission.Anotherexcellent specimen of
the modern zany is the curate, who apes therector, who apes the bishop,
who apes the archbishop, who apes thedevil.
ZANZIBARI, n.An inhabitant of the Sultanate of Zanzibar, off
theeastern coast of Africa.The Zanzibaris, a warlike people, are bestknown
in this country through a threatening diplomatic incident thatoccurred a
few years ago.The American consul at the capital occupieda dwelling that
faced the sea, with a sandy beach between.Greatly tothe scandal of this
official's family, and against repeatedremonstrances of the official himself,
the people of the citypersisted in using the beach for bathing.One day a
woman came downto the edge of the water and was stooping to remove
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her attire (a pairof sandals) when the consul, incensed beyond restraint,
fired a chargeof bird-shot into the most conspicuous part of her person.
Unfortunately for the existing _entente cordiale_ between two greatnations,
she was the Sultana.
ZEAL, n.A certain nervous disorder afflicting the young
andinexperienced.A passion that goeth before a sprawl.
When Zeal sought Gratitude for his reward He went away
exclaiming:"O my Lord!" "What do you want?" the Lord asked, bending
down. "An ointment for my cracked and bleeding crown."
Jum Coople
ZENITH, n.The point in the heavens directly overhead to a
manstanding or a growing cabbage.A man in bed or a cabbage in the potis
not considered as having a zenith, though from this view of thematter
there was once a considerably dissent among the learned, someholding
that the posture of the body was immaterial.These werecalled
Horizontalists, their opponents, Verticalists.TheHorizontalist heresy was
finally extinguished by Xanobus, thephilosopher-king of Abara, a zealous
Verticalist.Entering anassembly of philosophers who were debating the
matter, he cast asevered human head at the feet of his opponents and asked
them todetermine its zenith, explaining that its body was hanging by
theheels outside.Observing that it was the head of their leader,
theHorizontalists hastened to profess themselves converted to
whateveropinion the Crown might be pleased to hold, and Horizontalism
took itsplace among _fides defuncti_.
ZEUS, n.The chief of Grecian gods, adored by the Romans as
Jupiterand by the modern Americans as God, Gold, Mob and Dog.Some
explorerswho have touched upon the shores of America, and one who
professes tohave penetrated a considerable distance to the interior, have
thoughtthat these four names stand for as many distinct deities, but in
hismonumental work on Surviving Faiths, Frumpp insists that the
nativesare monotheists, each having no other god than himself, whom
heworships under many sacred names.
ZIGZAG, v.t.To move forward uncertainly, from side to side, as
onecarrying the white man's burden.(From _zed_, _z_, and _jag_,
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anIcelandic word of unknown meaning.)
He zedjagged so uncomen wyde Thet non coude pas on eyder syde; So,
to com saufly thruh, I been Constreynet for to doodge betwene.
Munwele
ZOOLOGY, n.The science and history of the animal kingdom,
includingits king, the House Fly (_Musca maledicta_).The father of
Zoologywas Aristotle, as is universally conceded, but the name of its
motherhas not come down to us.Two of the science's most
illustriousexpounders were Buffon and Oliver Goldsmith, from both of
whom welearn (_L'Histoire generale des animaux_ and _A History of
AnimatedNature_) that the domestic cow sheds its horn every two years.
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