Everything Must Go

When the Drury Lane theater was closed in 1709, Joseph Addison published a fanciful list of the properties for sale:

Spirits of right Nantz brandy, for lambent flames and apparitions.
Three bottles and a half of lightning.
One shower of snow in the whitest French paper.
Two showers of a browner sort.
A sea, consisting of a dozen large waves; the tenth bigger than ordinary, and a little damaged.
A dozen and a half of clouds, trimmed with black, and well-conditioned.
A rainbow, a little faded.
A set of clouds after the French mode, streaked with lightning, and furbelowed.
A new moon, something decayed.
A pint of the finest Spanish wash, being all that is left out of two hogsheads sent over last winter.
A coach very finely gilt, and little used, with a pair of dragons, to be sold cheap.
A setting-sun, a pennyworth.
An imperial mantle made for Cyrus the Great, and worn by Julius Caesar, Bajazet, King Harry the Eighth, and Signor Valentini.
A basket-hilted sword, very convenient to carry milk in.
Roxana’s night-gown.
Othello’s handkerchief.
The imperial robes of Xerxes, never worn but once.
A wild boar, killed by Mrs. Tofts and Dioclesian.
A serpent to sting Cleopatra.
A mustard-bowl to make thunder with.
Another of a bigger sort, by Mr. D—-s’s directions, little used.
Six elbow-chairs, very expert in country dances, with six flower-pots for their partners.
The whiskers of a Turkish Bassa.
The complexion of a murderer in a band-box; consisting of a large piece of burnt cork, and a coal-black peruke.
A suit of clothes for a ghost, viz. a bloody shirt, a doublet curiously pinked, and a coat with three great eyelet-holes upon the breast.
A bale of red Spanish wool.
Modern plots, commonly known by the name of trapdoors, ladders of ropes, vizard-masks, and tables with broad carpets over them.
Three oak-cudgels, with one of crab-tree; all bought for the use of Mr. Penkethman.
Materials for dancing; as masks, castanets, and a ladder of ten rounds.
Aurengezebe’s scymitar, made by Will. Brown in Piccadilly.
A plume of feathers, never used but by Œdipus and the Earl of Essex.

“Mr. D—-” is John Dennis, a critic. Elsewhere Addison wrote, “If we may believe our logicians, man is distinguished from all other creatures by the faculty of laughter.”

January 27, 2022January 26, 2022 | Humor

Love and Law

Writing in the San Francisco journal The Californian in 1865, Mark Twain answered this inquiry from a reader:

I loved and still love, the beautiful Edwitha Howard, and intended to marry her. Yet during my temporary absence at Benicia, last week, alas! she married Jones. Is my happiness to be thus blasted for life? Have I no redress?

“Of course you have,” Twain answered. He argued that intention is everything in the law — if you call your friend a fool, this is not an insult if you intended it playfully. And killing a man by accident does not constitute murder.

Ergo, if you had married Edwitha accidentally, and without really intending to do it, you would not actually be married to her at all, because the act of marriage could not be complete without the intention. And, ergo, in the strict spirit of the law, since you deliberately intended to marry Edwitha, and didn’t do it, you are married to her all the same — because, as I said before, the intention constitutes the crime. It is as clear as day that Edwitha is your wife, and your redress lies in taking a club and mutilating Jones with it as much as you can. Any man has a right to protect his own wife from the advances of other men.

But you have another alternative — you were married to Edwitha first, because of your deliberate intention, and now you can prosecute her for bigamy, in subsequently marrying Jones.

But there is another phase in this complicated case: You intended to marry Edwitha, and consequently, according to law, she is your wife — there is no getting around that — but she didn’t marry you, and if she never intended to marry you you are not her husband, of course. Ergo, in marrying Jones, she was guilty of bigamy, because she was the wife of another man at the time — which is all very well as far as it goes — but then, don’t you see, she had no other husband when she married Jones, and consequently she was not guilty of bigamy.

Now according to this view of the case, Jones married a spinster, who was a widow at the same time and another man’s wife at the same time, and yet who had no husband and never had one, and never had any intention of getting married, and therefore, of course, never had been married; and by the same reasoning you are a bachelor, because you have never been any one’s husband, and a married man because you have a wife living, and to all intents and purposes a widower, because you have been deprived of that wife, and a consummate ass for going off to Benicia in the first place, while things were so mixed.

“And by this time I have got myself so tangled up in the intricacies of this extraordinary case that I shall have to give up any further attempt to advise you,” he added. “I might get confused and fail to make myself understood. I think I could take up the argument where I left off, and by following it closely awhile, perhaps I could prove to your satisfaction, either that you never existed at all, or that you are dead, now, and consequently don’t need the faithless Edwitha — I think I could do that, if it would afford you any comfort.”

Misdemeanor

English wit Charles Stuart Calverley was “the hero of a hundred tales” at Cambridge. One Sunday, for no very good reason, he unhooked the inn sign from the Green Man at Trumpington and sprinted off with it toward the university. The innkeeper and several customers went after him, but Calverley gained ground and managed to escape to Christ’s College, where he ordered the porter to bar the gate and carried his prize to his rooms.

When the dean asked the meaning of the disturbance, he said, “Sir, an evil and adulterous generation seek after a sign, but no sign shall be given.”

November 22, 2021November 21, 2021 | Humor

Fowl Grace

Dr. Goldsmith tells a story of King Henry the Seventh’s Parrot, which fell out of the window of a room in the palace at Westminster, into the Thames, and at once called aloud, as it had heard people do, ‘A boat! twenty pounds for a boat!’ A waterman passing, took it up, and saved the poor bird’s life; and, on a question arising as to the amount to be paid to the man as a reward for restoring the Parrot, it was appealed to, when it instantly screamed out, ‘Give the knave a groat!’

— Zoological Sketches: Consisting of Descriptions of One Hundred and Twenty Animals, 1844

November 19, 2021 | Humor

Exchange

It was after the battle of Ypres when many wounded were returned to home hospitals where they received numerous solicitous visitors.

One dear old soul went around the wards speaking to each soldier in turn and inquiring of each the nature of his wounds.

‘And where about were you wounded my dear man?’ she asked one soldier.

‘Ypres, ma’am,’ the man replied.

‘Yes, yes, of course,’ said the dear old soul, ‘But where about? That is, in what way?’

‘Oh, I see what you mean,’ the soldier said. Then after a pause he added, ‘Well, ma’am, it’s like this; if you had been wounded where I was wounded, then you wouldn’t have been wounded at all.’

— Arthur E. Wrench, In Lighter Vein, 1976

August 10, 2021August 9, 2021 | Humor

Provisions

Good Fortune Burger of Toronto has named its menu items after office supplies so that customers can include them on expense reports:

Fortune Burger: Basic Steel Stapler
Diamond Chicken Burger: Mini Dry Erase Whiteboard
Double Your Fortune Burger: Ergonomic Aluminum Laptop Stand
Emerald Veggie Burger: Wired Earphones With Mic
Parmesan Fries: CPU Wireless Mouse
Ginger Beer: Yellow Lined Sticky Notes
San Pellegrino: Ball Point Black Ink Gel Pens
Build Your Fortune Burger: Silicone Keyboard Cover

“There’s no malice intended in it,” Director of Operations Jon Purdy told blogTO. “It’s all just fun and games.”

March 11, 2021March 10, 2021 | Humor

“Short Road to Wealth”

I’ll tell you a plan for gaining wealth,
Better than banking, trade, or leases;
Take a bank-note and fold it across,
And then you will find your money IN-CREASES!
This wonderful plan, without danger or loss,
Keeps your cash in your hands, and with nothing to trouble it;
And every time that you fold it across,
‘Tis plain as the light of the day that you DOUBLE it!

— Charles Carroll Bombaugh, Gleanings for the Curious From the Harvest-Fields of Literature, 1890

March 5, 2021March 5, 2021 | Humor

Fitting

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Benoit_Mandelbrot_mg_1804c.jpg — Image: Wikimedia Commons

What does the middle initial “B.” stand for in Benoit B. Mandelbrot’s name?

Benoit B. Mandelbrot.

In the Notices of the American Mathematical Society, Andrew Kern calls this “My single favorite math joke of all.”

(Intriguingly, Mandelbrot adopted his middle initial; it does not stand for a middle name.)

03/02/2021 UPDATE: Reader Dan Uznanski sent another:

What’s an anagram for Banach-Tarski?

Banach-Tarski Banach-Tarski.

February 25, 2021March 2, 2021 | Humor · Science & Math

Boom Town

In 1757 Ben Franklin revealed “How to make a Striking Sundial, by which not only a Man’s own Family, but all his Neighbours for ten Miles round, may know what o’Clock it is, when the Sun shines, without seeing the Dial”:

Chuse an open Place in your Yard or Garden, on which the Sun may shine all Day without any Impediment from Trees or Buildings. On the Ground mark out your Hour Lines, as for a horizontal Dial, according to Art, taking Room enough for the Guns. On the Line for One o’Clock, place one Gun; on the Two o’Clock Line two Guns, and so of the rest. The Guns must all be charged with Powder, but Ball is unnecessary. Your Gnomon or Style must have twelve burning Glasses annex’d to it, and be so placed as that the Sun shining through the Glasses, one after the other, shall cause the Focus or burning Spot to fall on the Hour Line of One for Example, at one a Clock, and there kindle a Train of Gunpowder that shall fire one Gun. At Two a Clock, a Focus shall fall on the Hour Line of Two, and kindle another Train that shall discharge two Guns successively; and so of the rest.

Note, There must be 78 Guns in all. Thirty-two Pounders will be best for this Use; but 18 Pounders may do, and will cost less, as well as use less Powder, for nine Pounds of Powder will do for one Charge of each eighteen Pounder, whereas the Thirty-two Pounders would require for each Gun 16 Pounds.

Note also, That the chief Expence will be the Powder, for the Cannon once bought, will, with Care, last 100 Years.

Note moreover, That there will be a great Saving of Powder in cloudy Days.

(From Poor Richard Improved. He was mocking a class of overambitious amateur experimenters called virtuosi. “Kind Reader, Methinks I hear thee say, That it is indeed a good Thing to know how the Time passes, but this Kind of Dial, notwithstanding the mentioned Savings, would be very expensive; and the Cost greater than the Advantage. Thou art wise, my Friend, to be so considerate beforehand; some Fools would not have found out so much, till they had made the Dial and try’d it. Let all such learn that many a private and many a publick Project, are like this Striking Dial, great Cost for little Profit.”)

November 19, 2020November 18, 2020 | Humor · Technology

Company

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Three_grotesque_old_men_with_awful_teeth_grimacing_and_point_Wellcome_V0012066.jpg — Image: Wikimedia Commons

Members of the Liverpool Ugly Faces Club, 1745:

Mathew Strong, merchant: “A tawny complexion, sharp nose, flook mouth, irregular bad set of teeth like those of an old worn out comb, thoroughly begrimed. A ghastly queer grin and countenance greatly set off by a long carroty beard.”
John Woods, architect: “A stone coloured complexion, a dimple in his attick story, the pilasters of his face fluted, tortoise eyed, a prominent nose, wild grin, and face altogether resembling a badger, and finer, though smaller than those of Sr Chryst WREN or Inego JONES.”
John Williamson Jr., merchant: “Ruff face, bleared eyes, flowing like two fountains, monstrous long nose, hooked like the beak of an eagle, pretty large mouth, upon the whole a charming member.”
William Long: “Rugged face, very prominent large nose, extraordinary wide mouth, no upper teeth, a large under lip, a prodigious long chin, meeting his nose like a pair of nutcrackers, an extraordinary member.”
Francis Gildart, Esq.: “Large pancake face, little, hollow grey eyes, short turnup, nose, large thick under lip, which almost meets his nose, odd droll, sancho, pancho, phiz, which gives life humour to everything he says. Therefore sets off a joke to ye utmost advantage.”
Robert Fillingham, merchant: “Little eyes, wide mouth, thin jaws, narrow face. His countenance hard, stern and crabbed. In every respect extremely well qualified.”
John Parr Sr., draper: “Broad, Punch like face, flat nose, wide nostrils, large mouth, thick lips, stern looks, sallow complexion, hideous grin.”
William Willocks, merchant: “Longish visage, very uncommon squinting eyes.”
Lewis Augs Younge, M.D.: “A large carbuncle potato nose, fine and bushy eyebrows, an agreeable facetious grin, wide mouth. When he laughs comes the shape of the moon at a quarter old, and on the whole, a face fitting a member of the Society.”

Worst, apparently, was merchant Joseph Farmer: “Little eyes, one bigger than ye other, long nose, thin lanthorn jaws, large upper lip, mouth from ear to ear resembling the mouth of a shark. A rotten set of irregular teeth, which are set off to great advantage by frequent laughing. His visage long and narrow. His looks upon the whole, extraordinary haggard, odd, comic, and out of ye way. In short, possessed of every extraordinary qualification to render him ye Phoenix of ye Society, as the like will not appear again this 1000 years.”

The club’s motto was Tetrum ante omnia vultum, “Before all things, an ugly face.”

(From the Liverpool Mercury, Sept. 29, 1887.)

November 3, 2020November 2, 2020 | History · Humor · Society