X in our alphabet being a needless letter has an added invincibility to the attacks of the spelling reformers, and like them, will doubtless last as long as the language. X is the sacred symbol of ten dollars, and in such words as Xmas, Xn, etc., stands for Christ, not, as is popular supposed, because it represents a cross, but because the corresponding 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 of psychology x stands for Woman's mind. Words beginning with X are Grecian and will not be defined in this standard English dictionary.
YANKEE, n.
In Europe, an American. In the Northern States of our Union, 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 entire past of
age.
YOKE, n.
An implement, madam, to whose Latin name, jugum, we owe
one of the most illuminating words in our language-- a word that
defines 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
of endowing a living Homer.
ZANY, n.
A popular character in old Italian plays, who imitated with
ludicrous incompetence the buffone, or clown, and was
therefore the ape of an ape; for the clown himself imitated the
serious characters of the play. The zany was progenitor to the
specialist in humor, as we to- day have the unhappiness to know
him. In the zany we see an example of creation; in the humorist,
of transmission. Another excellent specimen of the modern zany is
the curate, who apes the rector, who apes the bishop, who apes
the archbishop, who apes the devil.
ZANZIBARI, n.
An inhabitant of the Sultanate of Zanzibar, off the eastern
coast of Africa. The Zanzibaris, a warlike people, are best known
in this country through a threatening diplomatic incident that
occurred a few years ago. The American consul at the capital
occupied a dwelling that faced the sea, with a sandy beach
between. Greatly to the scandal of this official's family, and
against repeated remonstrances of the official himself, the
people of the city persisted in using the beach for bathing. One
day a woman came down to the edge of the water and was stooping
to remove her attire (a pair of sandals) when the consul,
incensed beyond restraint, fired a charge of bird- shot into the
most conspicuous part of her person. Unfortunately for the
existing entente cordiale between two great nations, she
was the Sultana.
ZEAL, n.
A certain nervous disorder afflicting the young and
inexperienced. A passion that goeth before a sprawl.
ZENITH, n.
The point in the heavens directly overhead to a man standing or
a growing cabbage. A man in bed or a cabbage in the pot is not
considered as having a zenith, though from this view of the
matter there was once a considerably dissent among the learned,
some holding that the posture of the body was immaterial. These
were called Horizontalists, their opponents, Verticalists. The
Horizontalist heresy was finally extinguished by Xanobus, the
philosopher- king of Abara, a zealous Verticalist. Entering an
assembly of philosophers who were debating the matter, he cast a
severed human head at the feet of his opponents and asked them to
determine its zenith, explaining that its body was hanging by the
heels outside. Observing that it was the head of their leader,
the Horizontalists hastened to profess themselves converted to
whatever opinion the Crown might be pleased to hold, and
Horizontalism took its place among fides defuncti.
ZEUS, n.
The chief of Grecian gods, adored by the Romans as Jupiter and
by the modern Americans as God, Gold, Mob and Dog. Some explorers
who have touched upon the shores of America, and one who
professes to have penetrated a considerable distance to the
interior, have thought that these four names stand for as many
distinct deities, but in his monumental work on Surviving Faiths,
Frumpp insists that the natives are monotheists, each having no
other god than himself, whom he worships under many sacred
names.
ZIGZAG, v.t.
To move forward uncertainly, from side to side, as one carrying
the white man's burden. (From zed, z, and
jag, an Icelandic word of unknown meaning.)
ZOOLOGY, n.
The science and history of the animal kingdom, including its
king, the House Fly (Musca maledicta). The father of
Zoology was Aristotle, as is universally conceded, but the name
of its mother has not come down to us. Two of the science's most
illustrious expounders were Buffon and Oliver Goldsmith, from
both of whom we learn ( L'Histoire generale des animaux
and A History of Animated Nature ) that the domestic cow sheds
its horn every two years.