The widow-queen of Portugal
Had an audacious jester
Who entered the confessional
Disguised and there confessed her.
"Father," she said, "thine ear bend down
My sins are more than scarlet:
I love my fool blaspheming clown,
And common, base-born varlet."
"Daughter," the mimic priest replied,
"That sin, indeed, is awful:
The church's pardon is denied
To love that is unlawful.
"But since thy stubborn heart will be
For him forever pleading,
Thou 'dst better make him, by decree,
A man of birth and breeding."
She made the fool a duke, in hope
With Heaven's taboo to palter;
Then told the priest, who told the pope,
Who damned her from the altar!
Barel Dort.
JOSS-STICKS, n. Small sticks burned
by the Chinese in their pagan tomfoolery, in imitation of certain sacred rites of our holy religion.
JUSTICE, n. A commodity which in a more or less adulterated condition the State sells to the citizen as a reward for his allegiance, taxes, and personal service.
K
circa Klatch KEEP, v.
He willed away his whole estate,
And then in death he fell asleep,
Murmuring: "Well, at any rate,
My name unblemished I shall keep."
But when upon the tomb't was wrought
Whose was it? for the dead keep naught.
Durang Gopbel Am.
KILT, n. A costume affected by Scotchmen in America and Americans in Scotland.
KINDNESS, n. A brief preface to ten volumes of exaction.
KING, n. A male person commonly known in America as a "crowned head," although he never wears a crown and has usually no head to speak of.
A king, in times long, long gone by,
Said to his lazy jester:
"If I were you and you were I
My moments merrily would fly
No care nor grief to pester."
"The reason, Sire, that you would thrive,"
The fool said "if you 'll hear it
Is that of all the fools alive
Who own you for their sovereign, I 've
The most forgiving spirit."
Oogum Bern.
"a crowd of wretched souls
That stay his cure: their malady convinces
The great essay of art; but at his touch,
Such sanctity hath Heaven given his hand
They presently amend,"
"'t is spoken,
To the succeeding royalty he leaves
The healing benediction."
scrofa , a sow. The date and author of the following epigram are unknown, but it is old enough to show that the jest about Scotland's national disorder is not a thing of yesterday.
Ye Kynge his evill in me laye,
Wh. he of Scottlande charmed awaye.
He layde his hand on mine and sayd:
"Be gone!" Ye ill no longer stayd.
But O ye wofull plyght in wh.
I 'm now y-pight: I have ye itche!
"strangely visited people,
All sworn and ulcerous, pitiful to the eye,
The mere despair of surgery,"
KLEPTOMANIAC, n. A rich thief.
KNIGHT, n.
Once a warrior gentle of birth,
Then a person of civic worth,
Now a fellow to move our mirth.
Warrior, person, and fellow no more:
We must knight our dogs to get any lower.
Brave Knights Kennelers then shall be,
Noble Knights of the Golden Flea,
Knights of the Order of St. Steboy,
Knights of St. Gorge and Knights of Jawy.
God speed the day when this knighting fad
Shall go to the dogs and the dogs go mad.
L
LACE, n. A delicate and costly textile fabric with which the female soul is netted like a fish.
The devil casting a seine of lace
(With precious stones 't was weighted)
Drew it in to the landing place
And its contents calculated.
All souls of women were in that sack
A draught miraculous, precious!
But ere he could throw it across his back
They 'd all escaped through the meshes.
Baruch de Loppis.
being born as trespassers, to exist on.
A life on the ocean wave,
A home on the rolling deep,
For the spark that nature gave
I have there the right to keep.
They give me the cat-o'-nine
Whenever I go ashore.
Then ho! for the flashing brine
I'ma natural commodore!
Dodle.
LAOCOÖN, n. A famous piece of antique sculpture representing a priest of that name and his two sons in the folds of two enormous serpents. The skill and diligence with which the old man and lads support the serpents and keep them up to their work have been justly regarded as one of the noblest artistic illustrations of the mastery of human intelligence over brute inertia.
LAP, n. One of the most important organs of the female system an admirable provision of nature for the repose of infancy, but chiefly useful in rural festivities to support plates of cold chicken and heads of adult males. The male of our species has a rudimentary lap, imperfectly developed and in no way contributing to the animal's substantial welfare.
LAST, n. A shoemaker's implement, named by a frowning Providence as opportunity to the maker of puns.
Ah, punster, would my lot were cast,
Where the cobbler is unknown,
So that I might forget his last
And hear your own.
Gargo Repsky.