s,
And mysteries, and mummeries, and hymns,
And disputations dire that lamed their limbs)
To serve his temple and maintain the fires,
Expound the law, manipulate the wires.
Amazed, the populace that rites attend,
Believe whate'er they cannot comprehend,
And, inly edified to learn that two
Half-hairs joined so and so (as Art can do)
Have sweeter values and a grace more fit
Than Nature's hairs that never have been split,
Bring cates and wines for sacrificial feasts,
And sell their garments to support the priests.

ARTLESSNESS, n. A certain engaging quality to which women attain by
long study and severe practice upon the admiring male, who is pleased
to fancy it resembles the candid simplicity of his young.

ASPERSE, v.t. Maliciously to ascribe to another vicious actions which
one has not had the temptation and opportunity to commit.

ASS, n. A public singer with a good voice but no ear. In Virginia
City, Nevada, he is called the Washoe Canary, in Dakota, the Senator,
and everywhere the Donkey. The animal is widely and variously
celebrated in the literature, art and religion of every age and
country; no other so engages and fires the human imagination as this
noble vertebrate. Indeed, it is doubted by some (Ramasilus, _lib.
II., De Clem._, and C. Stantatus, _De Temperamente_) if it is not a
god; and as such we know it was worshiped by the Etruscans, and, if we
may believe Macrobious, by the Cupasians also. Of the only two
animals admitted into the Mahometan Paradise along with the souls of
men, the ass that carried Balaam is one, the dog of the Seven Sleepers
the other. This is no small distinction. From what has been written
about this beast might be compiled a library of great splendor and
magnitude, rivalling that of the Shakespearean cult, and that which
clusters about the Bible. It may be said, generally, that all
literature is more or less Asinine.

"Hail, holy Ass!" the quiring angels sing;
"Priest of Unreason, and of Discords King!"
Great co-Creator, let Thy glory shine:
God made all else, the Mule, the Mule is thine!"

G.J.

AUCTIONEER, n. The man who proclaims with a hammer that he has picked
a pocket with his tongue.

AUSTRALIA, n. A country lying in the South Sea, whose industrial and
commercial development has been unspeakably retarded by an unfortunate
dispute among geographers as to whether it is a continent or an
island.

AVERNUS, n. The lake by