Vanity Fair (UK), November 17, 1904
[See attribution note on Vanity Fair menu page]
 

In the Stocks.
 

SOMEONE at Kokomo, Indiana, has discovered a live lizard encased in solid rock. It was hermetically sealed from light, air, warmth, and moisture, and is believed to be many thousands of years old. The visitor was at once interviewed by a bevy of American reporters, who wished to know what were its impressions of their glorious country.

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A labourer who has been fined at Menai Bridge said that he only knew sufficient of the English language to call for beer. For all the practical purposes of life he was a linguist.

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In a poaching case at Bideford the prisoner was discharged on the ground that he wished to join the police. The rest of the Force would like it to be known that crime is not an indispensable qualification for membership. Many of them have quite a respect for the laws.

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The convicts at the French penal colony of Noumea have organised a band. The leader is a celebrated murderer, the cymbal-player, though hardly up to his leader’s form, has slain a subpœna-server, and the man who beats the drum practised for the position by beating his landlord with a hammer. We trust that they are not going to follow the example of the Kilties, and tour in England.

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THE CLERK’S LAMENT.

(The shareholders of the Aërated Bread Co. complain that the A.B.C. girls are not pretty enough.)

Time was when office cares perplexed
 And rendered me unhappy,
When “dumping” made the chiefs quite vexed,
 And consequently snappy,
When one had chimed, I’d fade from view
 And seek the nearest tea-shop:
I looked for sympathy from you,
 Maid of the A.B.C. shop.

As when a thirsty traveller, who
 Is touring desert places,
Detects at last, when all seems blue,
 A genuine oasis;
He flings himself upon the sward,
 And rises fit for duty—
Just so was I bucked up, restored,
 By gazing on your beauty.

As on my penny roll I pressed
 Its complement of butter,
The thoughts that rose within my breast
 Were more than I could utter.
Your beauty set my heart ablaze,
 I longed for words to hymn it:
In fact, to use a Yankee phrase,
 I thought you “just the limit.”

But now I hear my taste’s at fault,
 My judgment, I am told, errs:
They say she is not worth her salt,
 Those callous, cold shareholders.
My hopes are crumbled into dust,
 My fondest dreams are scattered,
Ah, well, it’s really only just
 One more illusion shattered.

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During the last few years, said Lord Lansdowne last Wednesday, arbitration has become the fashion. So much is this so, indeed, that at our public schools many boys have proposed its substitution for caning, which, they hold, is a method of ancient barbarism.

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There was only one unpleasant incident to mar President Roosevelt’s election festivities: the Kaiser sent him a telegram and he had to read it.

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A little friction has been caused at Leghorn by the unreasonable behaviour of a corpse. A gentleman of the town, having been duly bowled over by a passing motor, was certified dead and deposited in the shop of the nearest undertaker. Feeling bored during the night he got up, selected a hat from those which were scattered about the shop, and walked home, where, having made an excellent breakfast, he went to bed. The undertaker has lodged a complaint. He says that any gentleman as is a gentleman would not take the poor man’s bread out of his mouth simply in order to gratify a selfish whim. The corpse warmly maintains that everyone has a right to change his mind. And there the situation rests. R.I.P.

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Those who scoffed at woman as a rival of man in the field of literature are wishing now that they had not spoken. It is admitted that the four most unpleasant novels of the year have been written by ladies.

Rasper. 


 

Printed unsigned in Vanity Fair; entered by Wodehouse as “In the Stocks” for this date in Money Received for Literary Work. It is possible that not all individual items are by Wodehouse.