FAIRY, n.
A creature, variously fashioned and endowed, that formerly
inhabited the meadows and forests. It was nocturnal in its
habits, and somewhat addicted to dancing and the theft of
children. The fairies are now believed by naturalist to be
extinct, though a clergyman of the Church of England saw three
near Colchester as lately as 1855, while passing through a park
after dining with the lord of the manor. The sight greatly
staggered him, and he was so affected that his account of it was
incoherent.
Justinian Gaux, a writer of the fourteenth century,
avers that so great is the fairies' power of transformation that
he saw one change itself into two opposing armies and fight a
battle with great slaughter, and that the next day, after it had
resumed its original shape and gone away, there were seven
hundred bodies of the slain which the villagers had to bury. He
does not say if any of the wounded recovered. In the time of
Henry III, of England, a law was made which prescribed the death
penalty for "Kyllynge, wowndynge, or mamynge" a fairy, and it was
universally respected.
FAITH, n.
Belief without evidence in what is told by one who speaks
without knowledge, of things without parallel.
FAMOUS, adj.
Conspicuously miserable.
FASHION, n.
A despot whom the wise ridicule and obey.
FEAST, n.
A festival. A religious celebration usually signalized by
gluttony and drunkenness, frequently in honor of some holy person
distinguished for abstemiousness. In the Roman Catholic Church
feasts are "movable" and "immovable," but the celebrants are
uniformly immovable until they are full. In their earliest
development these entertainments took the form of feasts for the
dead; such were held by the Greeks, under the name
Nemeseia, by the Aztecs and Peruvians, as in modern
times they are popular with the Chinese; though it is believed
that the ancient dead, like the modern, were light eaters. Among
the many feasts of the Romans was the Novemdiale, which
was held, according to Livy, whenever stones fell from
heaven.
FELON, n.
A person of greater enterprise than discretion, who in embracing
an opportunity has formed an unfortunate attachment.
FEMALE, n.
One of the opposing, or unfair, sex.
FIB, n.
A lie that has not cut its teeth. An habitual liar's nearest
approach to truth: the perigee of his eccentric orbit.
FICKLENESS, n.
The iterated satiety of an enterprising affection.
FIDDLE, n.
An instrument to tickle human ears by friction of a horse's tail
on the entrails of a cat.
FIDELITY, n.
A virtue peculiar to those who are about to be betrayed.
FINANCE, n.
The art or science of managing revenues and resources for the
best advantage of the manager. The pronunciation of this word
with the i long and the accent on the first syllable is one of
America's most precious discoveries and possessions.
FLAG, n.
A colored rag borne above troops and hoisted on forts and ships.
It appears to serve the same purpose as certain signs that one
sees and vacant lots in London-- "Rubbish may be shot here."
FLESH, n.
The Second Person of the secular Trinity.
FLOP, v.
Suddenly to change one's opinions and go over to
another party. The most notable flop on record was that of Saul
of Tarsus, who has been severely criticised as a turn- coat by
some of our partisan journals.
FLY- SPECK, n.
The prototype of punctuation. It is observed by Garvinus that
the systems of punctuation in use by the various literary nations
depended originally upon the social habits and general diet of
the flies infesting the several countries. These creatures, which
have always been distinguished for a neighborly and companionable
familiarity with authors, liberally or niggardly embellish the
manuscripts in process of growth under the pen, according to
their bodily habit, bringing out the sense of the work by a
species of interpretation superior to, and independent of, the
writer's powers.
The "old masters" of literature-- that is to say, the early
writers whose work is so esteemed by later scribes and critics in
the same language-- never punctuated at all, but worked right
along free- handed, without that abruption of the thought which
comes from the use of points.
FOLLY, n.
That "gift and faculty divine" whose creative and controlling
energy inspires Man's mind, guides his actions and adorns his
life.
FOOL, n.
A person who pervades the domain of intellectual speculation and
diffuses himself through the channels of moral activity. He is
omnific, omniform, omnipercipient, omniscience, omnipotent. He it
was who invented letters, printing, the railroad, the steamboat,
the telegraph, the platitude and the circle of the sciences. He
created patriotism and taught the nations war-- founded
theology, philosophy, law, medicine and Chicago. He established
monarchical and republican government. He is from everlasting to
everlasting-- such as creation's dawn beheld he fooleth now. In
the morning of time he sang upon primitive hills, and in the
noonday of existence headed the procession of being. His
grandmotherly hand was warmly tucked- in the set sun of
civilization, and in the twilight he prepares Man's evening meal
of milk- and-morality and turns down the covers of the universal grave.
And after the rest of us shall have retired for the night of
eternal oblivion he will sit up to write a history of human
civilization.
FORCE, n.
"Force is but might," the teacher said-- "That definition's just."
The boy said naught but thought instead,
Remembering his pounded head:
"Force is not might but must!"
FOREFINGER, n.
The finger commonly used in pointing out two malefactors.
FORGETFULNESS, n.
A gift of God bestowed upon doctors in compensation for their
destitution of conscience.
FORK, n.
An instrument used chiefly for the purpose of putting dead
animals into the mouth. Formerly the knife was employed for this
purpose, and by many worthy persons is still thought to have many
advantages over the other tool, which, however, they do not
altogether reject, but use to assist in charging the knife. The
immunity of these persons from swift and awful death is one of
the most striking proofs of God's mercy to those that hate
Him.
FORMA PAUPERIS [Latin]
In the character of a poor person-- a method by which
a litigant without money for lawyers is considerately permitted
to lose his case.
FRANKALMOIGNE, n.
The tenure by which a religious corporation holds lands on
condition of praying for the soul of the donor. In mediaeval
times many of the wealthiest fraternities obtained their estates
in this simple and cheap manner, and once when Henry VIII of
England sent an officer to confiscate certain vast possessions
which a fraternity of monks held by frankalmoigne, "What!" said
the Prior, "would you master stay our benefactor's soul in
Purgatory?" "Ay," said the officer, coldly, "an ye will not pray
him thence for naught he must e'en roast." "But look you, my
son," persisted the good man, "this act hath rank as robbery of
God!" "Nay, nay, good father, my master the king doth but deliver
him from the manifold temptations of too great wealth."
FREEBOOTER, n.
A conqueror in a small way of business, whose annexations lack
of the sanctifying merit of magnitude.
FREEDOM, n.
Exemption from the stress of authority in a beggarly half dozen
of restraint's infinite multitude of methods. A political
condition that every nation supposes itself to enjoy in virtual
monopoly. Liberty. The distinction between freedom and liberty is
not accurately known; naturalists have never been able to find a
living specimen of either.
FREEMASONS, n.
An order with secret rites, grotesque ceremonies and fantastic
costumes, which, originating in the reign of Charles II, among
working artisans of London, has been joined successively by the
dead of past centuries in unbroken retrogression until now it
embraces all the generations of man on the hither side of Adam
and is drumming up distinguished recruits among the
pre- Creational inhabitants of Chaos and Formless Void. The order
was founded at different times by Charlemagne, Julius Caesar,
Cyrus, Solomon, Zoroaster, Confucious, Thothmes, and Buddha. Its
emblems and symbols have been found in the Catacombs of Paris and
Rome, on the stones of the Parthenon and the Chinese Great Wall,
among the temples of Karnak and Palmyra and in the Egyptian
Pyramids-- always by a Freemason.
FRIENDLESS, adj.
Having no favors to bestow. Destitute of fortune. Addicted to
utterance of truth and common sense.
FRIENDSHIP, n.
A ship big enough to carry two in fair weather, but only one in
foul.
FROG, n.
A reptile with edible legs. The first mention of frogs in
profane literature is in Homer's narrative of the war between
them and the mice. Skeptical persons have doubted Homer's
authorship of the work, but the learned, ingenious and
industrious Dr. Schliemann has set the question forever at rest
by uncovering the bones of the slain frogs. One of the forms of
moral suasion by which Pharaoh was besought to favor the
Israelities was a plague of frogs, but Pharaoh, who liked them
fricasees, remarked, with truly oriental stoicism, that
he could stand it as long as the frogs and the Jews could; so the
programme was changed. The frog is a diligent songster, having a
good voice but no ear. The libretto of his favorite opera, as
written by Aristophanes, is brief, simple and effective--
"brekekex- koax"; the music is apparently by that eminent
composer, Richard Wagner. Horses have a frog in each hoof-- a
thoughtful provision of nature, enabling them to shine in a
hurdle race.
FRYING- PAN, n.
One part of the penal apparatus employed in that punitive
institution, a woman's kitchen. The frying- pan was invented by
Calvin, and by him used in cooking span- long infants that had
died without baptism; and observing one day the horrible torment
of a tramp who had incautiously pulled a fried babe from the
waste- dump and devoured it, it occurred to the great divine to
rob death of its terrors by introducing the frying- pan into every
household in Geneva. Thence it spread to all corners of the
world, and has been of invaluable assistance in the propagation
of his sombre faith.
FUNERAL, n.
A pageant whereby we attest our respect for the dead by
enriching the undertaker, and strengthen our grief by an
expenditure that deepens our groans and doubles our tears.
FUTURE, n.
That period of time in which our affairs prosper, our friends
are true and our happiness is assured.