The Cynic's Word Book. Bierce Ambrose

a cat cannot slip through the thicket of shins

           Nor hear its own shriek for the noise of their

           chins.

           On clerks and on pages, and porters, and all,

           Misfortune attend and disaster befall!

           May life be to them a succession of hurts;

           May fleas by the bushel inhabit their shirts;

           May aches and diseases encamp in their bones,

           Their lungs full of tubercles, bladders of stones;

           May microbes, bacilli, their tissues infest,

           And tapeworms securely their bowels digest;

           May corn-cobs be snared without hope in their hair,

           And frequent impalement their pleasure impair.

           Disturbed be their dreams by the awful discourse

           Of menacing dressers, sepulchrally hoarse,

           By chairs acrobatic and wavering floors —

           The mattress that kicks and the pillow that snores!

           Sons of cupidity, cradled in sin!

           Their criminal ranks may the death angel thin,

           Avenging the friend whom I could n't work in.

           K. Q.

      COMPROMISE, n, Such an adjustment of conflicting interests as gives each adversary the satisfaction of thinking he has got what he ought not to have, and is deprived of nothing except what was justly his due.

      COMPULSION, n. The eloquence of power.

      CONDOLE, v. i. To show that bereavement is a smaller evil than sympathy.

      CONFIDANT, CONFIDANTE, n. One entrusted by A with the secrets of B confided to himself by C.

      CONGRATULATION, n. The civility of envy.

      CONGRESS, n. A body of men who meet to repeal laws.

      CONNOISSEUR, n. A specialist who knows everything about something and nothing about anything else.

      An old wine-bibber having been smashed in a railway collision, some wine was poured upon his lips to revive him. "Pauillac, 1873," he murmured and died.

      CONSERVATIVE, n. A statesman who is enamored of existing evils, as distinguished from the Liberal, who wishes to replace them with others.

      CONSOLATION, n. The knowledge that a better man is more unfortunate than yourself.

      CONSUL, n. In American politics, a person who having failed to secure an office from the people is given one by the Administration on condition that he leave the country.

      CONSULT, v. t. To seek another's approval to a course already decided on.

      CONTEMPT, n. The feeling of a prudent man for an enemy who is too formidable safely to be opposed.

      CONTROVERSY, n. A battle in which spittle or ink replaces the injurious cannon-ball and the inconsiderate bayonet.

           In controversy with the facile tongue —

           That bloodless warfare of the old and young —

           So seek your adversary to engage

           That on himself he shall exhaust his rage,

           And, like a snake that's fastened to the ground,

           With his own fangs inflict the fatal wound.

           You ask me how this miracle is done?

           Adopt his own opinions, one by one,

           And taunt him to refute them; in his wrath

           He 'll sweep them pitilessly from his path.

           Advance then gently all you wish to prove,

           Each proposition prefaced with, "As you 've

           So well remarked," or, "As you wisely say,

           And I cannot dispute," or, "By the way,

           This view of it which, better far expressed,

           Runs through your argument." Then leave

           the rest

           To him, secure that he 'll perform his trust

           And prove your views intelligent and just.

           Conmore Apel Brune.

      CONVENT, n. A place of retirement for women who wish for leisure to meditate upon the sin of idleness.

      CONVERSATION, n. A fair for the display of the minor mental commodities, each exhibitor being too intent upon the arrangement of his own wares to observe those of his neighbor.

      CORONATION, n. The ceremony of investing a sovereign with the outward and visible signs of his divine right to be blown skyhigh with a dynamite bomb.

      CORPORAL, n. A man who occupies the lowest rung of the military ladder.

           Fiercely the battle raged and, sad to tell,

           Our corporal heroically fell!

           Fame from her height looked down upon the brawl

           And said: "He had n't very far to fall."

           Giacomo Smith.

      CORPORATION, n. An ingenious device for securing individual profit without individual responsibility.

      CORSAIR, n. A politician of the seas.

      COURT FOOL, n. The plaintiff.

      COWARD, n. One who in a perilous emergency thinks with his legs.

      CRAFT, n. A fool's substitute for brains.

      CRAYFISH, n. A small crustacean very much resembling the lobster, but less indigestible.

      In this small fish I take it that human wisdom is admirably figured and symbolized; for whereas the crayfish doth move only backward, and can have only retrospection, seeing naught but the perils already passed, so the wisdom of man doth not enable him to avoid the follies that beset his course, but only to apprehend their nature afterward. – Sir James Merivale.

      CREDITOR, n. One of a tribe of savages dwelling beyond the Financial Straits and dreaded for their desolating incursions.

      CREMONA, n. A high-priced violin made in Connecticut.

      CRITIC, n. A person who boasts himself hard to please because nobody has ever tried to please him.

           There is a land of pure delight,

           Beyond the Jordan's flood,

           Where saints, apparelled all in white,

           Fling back the critic's mud.

           And as he legs it through the skies,

           His pelt a sable hue,

           He sorrows sore to recognize

           The missiles that he threw.

           G. J.

      CROSS, n. An ancient religious symbol erroneously supposed to owe its significance to the most solemn event in the history of Christianity, but really antedating it by thousands of years. By many it has been believed to be identical with the crux ansata of the ancient phallic worship, but it has been traced even beyond all that we know of that, to the rites of primitive peoples. We have today the White Cross as a symbol of chastity, and the Red Cross as a badge of benevolent neutrality in war. Having