<?xml version="1.0"?>       <!DOCTYPE package PUBLIC "+//ISBN 0-9673008-1-9//DTD OEB 1.0 Package//EN"         "http://openebook.org/dtds/oeb-1.0/oebdoc1.dtd"><html><head><meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/x-oeb1-document; charset=utf-8" /><link rel="stylesheet" type="text/x-oeb1-css" href="devil.css" /><title>The Devil&#8217;s Dictionary: W</title></head><body lang="en-US">  <h1>W</h1> <p class="firstpara">W (double U) has,of all the letters in our alphabet, the only cumbrous name, the names of theothers being monosyllabic. This advantage of the Roman alphabet over the Grecianis the more valued after audibly spelling out some simple Greek word, like <i>epixoriambikos</i>. Still, it is now thoughtby the learned that other agencies than the difference of the two alphabets mayhave been concerned in the decline of “the glory that was Greece” and the riseof “the grandeur that was Rome.” There can be no doubt, however, that bysimplifying the name of W (calling it “wow,” for example) our civilizationcould be, if not promoted, at least better endured.</p> <p class="entry"><span class="def">Wall Street</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Asymbol for sin for every devil to rebuke. That Wall Street is a den of thievesis a belief that serves every unsuccessful thief in place of a hope in Heaven. Eventhe great and good Andrew Carnegie has made his profession of faith in thematter.</p> <div class="poem"><p class="poetry">Carnegie the dauntlesshas uttered his call To battle: “The brokers are parasites all!” Carnegie,Carnegie, you’ll never prevail;</p> <p class="poetry">Keep the wind of your slogan to belly your sail, Go back to your isle of perpetual brume,Silence your pibroch, doff tartan and plume:</p> <p class="poetry">Ben Lomond is calling his son from the fray—</p> <p class="poetry">Fly, fly from the region of Wall Street away! While still you’re possessed of a single baubee (Iwish it were pledged to endowment of me) ‘Twere wise to retreat from the warsof finance Lest its value decline ere your credit advance. For a man ‘twixt aking of finance and the sea, Carnegie, Carnegie, your tongue is too free!</p> <p class="citeauth">Anonymus Bink</p></div> <p class="entry"><span class="def">war</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A by-product of the arts ofpeace. The most menacing political condition is a period ofinternational amity. The student of history who has not been taughtto expect the unexpected may justly boast himself inaccessible to thelight. “In time of peace prepare for war” has a deeper meaning thanis commonly discerned; it means, not merely that all things earthlyhave an end—that change is the one immutable and eternal law—butthat the soil of peace is thickly sown with the seeds of war andsingularly suited to their germination and growth. It was when Kubla Khanhad decreed his “stately pleasure dome”—when, that is to say, therewere peace and fat feasting in Xanadu—that he heard from afarAncestral voices prophesying war.</p> <p class="indentpara">One of thegreatest of poets, Coleridge was one of the wisest of men, and it was not fornothing that he read us this parable. Let us have a little less of “handsacross the sea,” and a little more of that elemental distrust that is thesecurity of nations. War loves to come like a thief in the night; professionsof eternal amity provide the night.</p> <p class="entry"><span class="def">Washingtonian</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> APotomac tribesman who exchanged the privilege of governing himself for theadvantage of good government. In justice to him it should be said that he didnot want to.</p> <div class="poem"><p class="poetry">They took away his vote and gave instead<br />The right, when he had earned, to <i>eat</i> his bread.<br />In vain—he clamors for his “boss,” pour soul,<br />To come again and part him from his roll.</p> <p class="citeauth">Offenbach Stutz</p></div> <p class="entry"><span class="def">weaknesses</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span>pl. Certainprimal powers of Tyrant Woman wherewith she holds dominion over the male of herspecies, binding him to the service of her will and paralyzing his rebelliousenergies.</p> <p class="entry"><span class="def">weather</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Theclimate of the hour. A permanent topic of conversation among persons whom itdoes not interest, but who have inherited the tendency to chatter about it fromnaked arboreal ancestors whom it keenly concerned. The setting up officialweather bureaus and their maintenance in mendacity prove that even governmentsare accessible to suasion by the rude forefathers of the jungle.</p> <div class="poem"><p class="poetry">Once I dipt intothe future far as human eye could see, And I saw the Chief Forecaster, dead asany one can be—</p> <p class="poetry">Dead and damnedand shut in Hades as a liar from his birth, With a record of unreason seldomparalleled on earth. While I looked he reared him solemnly, that incadescentyouth, From the coals that he’d preferred to the advantages of truth. He casthis eyes about him and above him; then he wrote On a slab of thin asbestos whatI venture here to quote—</p> <p class="poetry">For I read it inthe rose-light of the everlasting glow:</p> <p class="poetry">“Cloudy; variablewinds, with local showers; cooler; snow.”</p> <p class="citeauth">Halcyon Jones</p></div> <p class="entry"><span class="def">wedding</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Aceremony at which two persons undertake to become one, one undertakes to becomenothing, and nothing undertakes to become supportable.</p> <p class="entry"><span class="def">werewolf</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Awolf that was once, or is sometimes, a man. All werewolves are of evildisposition, having assumed a bestial form to gratify a beastial appetite, butsome, transformed by sorcery, are as humane and is consistent with an acquiredtaste for human flesh.</p> <p>Some Bavarian peasants having caught a wolf one evening, tied it to a post by the tail andwent to bed. The next morning nothing was there! Greatly perplexed, theyconsulted the local priest, who told them that their captive was undoubtedly awerewolf and had resumed its human for during the night. “The next time thatyou take a wolf,” the good man said, “see that you chain it by the leg, and inthe morning you will find a Lutheran.”</p> <p class="entry"><span class="def">Whangdepootenawah,</span> <span class="pos">n.</span> In theOjibwa tongue, disaster; an unexpected affliction that strikes hard.</p> <div class="poem"><p class="poetry">Should you ask me whence this laughter,</p><p class="poetry">Whence this audible big-smiling,</p><p class="poetry">With its labial extension,</p><p class="poetry">With its maxillar distortion</p><p class="poetry">And its diaphragmic rhythmus</p><p class="poetry">Like the billowing of an ocean,</p><p class="poetry">Like the shaking of a carpet,</p><p class="poetry">I should answer, I should tell you:</p><p class="poetry">From the great deeps of the spirit,</p><p class="poetry">From the unplummeted abysmus</p><p class="poetry">Of the soul this laughter welleth</p><p class="poetry">As the fountain, the gug-guggle,</p><p class="poetry">Like the river from the canon [sic],</p><p class="poetry">To entoken and give warning</p><p class="poetry">That my present mood is sunny.</p><p class="poetry">Should you ask me further question—</p><p class="poetry">Why the great deeps of the spirit,</p><p class="poetry">Why the unplummeted abysmus</p><p class="poetry">Of the soule extrudes this laughter,</p><p class="poetry">This all audible big-smiling,</p><p class="poetry">I should answer, I should tell you</p><p class="poetry">With a white heart, tumpitumpy,</p><p class="poetry">With a true tongue, honest Injun:</p><p class="poetry">William Bryan, he has Caught It,</p><p class="poetry">Caught the Whangdepootenawah!</p><p class="poetry">Is’t the sandhill crane, the shankank,</p><p class="poetry">Standing in the marsh, the kneedeep,</p><p class="poetry">Standing silent in the kneedeep</p><p class="poetry">With his wing-tips crossed behind him</p><p class="poetry">And his neck close-reefed before him,</p><p class="poetry">With his bill, his william, buried</p><p class="poetry">In the down upon his bosom,</p><p class="poetry">With his head retracted inly,</p><p class="poetry">While his shoulders overlook it?</p><p class="poetry">Does the sandhill crane, the shankank,</p><p class="poetry">Shiver grayly in the north wind,</p><p class="poetry">Wishing he had died when little,</p><p class="poetry">As the sparrow, the chipchip, does?</p><p class="poetry">No ‘tis not the Shankank standing,</p><p class="poetry">Standing in the gray and dismal</p><p class="poetry">Marsh, the gray and dismal kneedeep.</p><p class="poetry">No, ‘tis peerless William Bryan</p><p class="poetry">Realizing that he’s Caught It,</p><p class="poetry">Caught the Whangdepootenawah!</p></div> <p class="entry"><span class="def">wheat</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> A cerealfrom which a tolerably good whisky can with some difficulty be made, and whichis used also for bread. The French are said to eat more bread <i>per capita</i> of population than any otherpeople, which is natural, for only they know how to make the stuff palatable.</p> <p class="entry"><span class="def">white</span>, <span class="pos">adj.</span> and n.Black.</p> <p class="entry"><span class="def">widow</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Apathetic figure that the Christian world has agreed to take humorously,although Christ’s tenderness towards widows was one of the most marked featuresof his character.</p> <p class="entry"><span class="def">wine</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Fermentedgrape-juice known to the Women’s Christian Union as “liquor,” sometimes as“rum.” Wine, madam, is God’s next best gift to man.</p> <p class="entry"><span class="def">wit</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> The saltwith which the American humorist spoils his intellectual cookery by leaving itout.</p> <p class="entry"><span class="def">witch</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> (1) Anyugly and repulsive old woman, in a wicked league with the devil. (2) Abeautiful and attractive young woman, in wickedness a league beyond the devil.</p> <p class="entry"><span class="def">witticism</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Asharp and clever remark, usually quoted, and seldom noted; what the Philistineis pleased to call a “joke.”</p> <p class="entry"><span class="def">woman</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span></p> <p>An animal usuallyliving in the vicinity of Man, and having a rudimentary susceptibility todomestication. It is credited by many of the elder zoologists with a certainvestigial docility acquired in a former state of seclusion, but naturalists ofthe postsusananthony period, having no knowledge of the seclusion, deny thevirtue and declare that such as creation’s dawn beheld, it roareth now. Thespecies is the most widely distributed of all beasts of prey, infesting allhabitable parts of the globe, from Greeland’s spicy mountains to India’s moralstrand. The popular name (wolfman) is incorrect, for the creature is of the catkind. The woman is lithe and graceful in its movement, especially the Americanvariety (<i>felis pugnans</i>), is omnivorous and can be taught not to talk.</p> <p class="citeauth">Balthasar Pober</p> <p class="entry"><span class="def">worms’-meat</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Thefinished product of which we are the raw material. The contents of the TajMahal, the Tombeau Napoleon and the Granitarium. Worms’-meat is usuallyoutlasted by the structure that houses it, but “this too must pass away.” Probablythe silliest work in which a human being can engage is construction of a tombfor himself. The solemn purpose cannot dignify, but only accentuates bycontrast the foreknown futility.</p> <div class="poem"><p class="poetry">Ambitious fool! so mad to be a show!<br />How profitless the labor you bestow<br />Upon a dwelling whose magnificence<br />The tenant neither can admire nor know.<br />Build deep, build high, build massive as you can,<br />The wanton grass-roots will defeat the plan<br />By shouldering asunder all the stones<br />In what to you would be a moment’s span.<br />Time to the dead so all unreckoned flies<br />That when your marble is all dust, arise,<br />If wakened, stretch your limbs and yawn—<br />You’ll think you scarcely can have closed your eyes.<br />What though of all man’s works your tomb aloneShould stand till Time himself be overthrown?<br />Would it advantage you to dwell therein<br />Forever as a stain upon a stone?</p> <p class="citeauth">Joel Huck</p></div> <p class="entry"><span class="def">worship</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> HomoCreator’s testimony to the sound construction and fine finish of Deus Creatus. Apopular form of abjection, having an element of pride.</p> <p class="entry"><span class="def">wrath</span>, <span class="pos">n.</span> Anger ofa superior quality and degree, appropriate to exalted characters and momentousoccasions; as, “the wrath of God,” “the day of wrath,” etc. Amongst theancients the wrath of kings was deemed sacred, for it could usually command theagency of some god for its fit manifestation, as could also that of a priest. TheGreeks before Troy were so harried by Apollo that they jumped out of thefrying-pan of the wrath of Cryses into the fire of the wrath of Achilles,though Agamemnon, the sole offender, was neither fried nor roasted. A similarnoted immunity was that of David when he incurred the wrath of Yahveh bynumbering his people, seventy thousand of whom paid the penalty with theirlives. God is now Love, and a director of the census performs his work withoutapprehension of disaster.</p> </body>    </html>