CLASS POEM OF 1932

By Eloise Jarvis McGraw
Author of The Rundelstone of Oz, Merry Go Round in Oz, The Forbidden Fountain of Oz, The Moorchild, etc.

Originally published under her maiden name Eloise Alton Jarvis in the 1932 Yearbook of Classen High School, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma.


Out of the blurred past
Comes reality
And sudden clearness, like the smooth green, foamless wave
Riding to break white upon the shore.
And now my careless years
Are close upon the frowning rocks
Where they must pound and strive incessantly.
But these hazy years, traversed so blindly,
Have yet a tale to tell—a prize to show:
They have taught me how to hurl upon the crags
Receiving least hurt—most gain!
Some day the rocks will have worn away
Under the silver crashing of an eternity of breakers.

THE FORGETFUL POET

 

By Ruth Plumly Thompson

Originally published in the Philadelphia Public Ledger, July 25, 1920.

The Puzzle Corner

The Forgetful Poet answers last week’s puzzles as follows:

The missing word in the rhyme is “Puffin,” and a house is like a book because it is make up of stories.

The two letters of the alphabet which make a word meaning to surpass are X and L, but you must spell them out so that they will read excel.

Copyright © 2016 Eric Shanower and David Maxine. All rights reserved.

THE DISH THAT WON A PRINCESS

By Ruth Plumly Thompson 
Author of The Lost King of Oz, Ozoplaning with the Wizard of Oz, The Wish Express, "King, King! Double King!" etc.
 
Originally published in the Philadelphia Public Ledger, March 16, 1919,


It was time the Princess Slimgrace was married; so King Hadalongname had decided; but there was one trouble—that was, to find something difficult for the young princes to accomplish as a test of their love and worthiness. The King thought and thought, but every time he seemed about to decide on some suitable feat, he fell asleep. It was very provoking when such an important matter was at stake.

Finally the King called the Prime Minister of the Private Affairs of the Palace, who looked very wise as he came into the King’s chamber, carrying several huge folios. “Your Majesty,” he began, bowing as low as his weighty burden would permit, “has summoned his most humble servant, I believe.” Here he paused, and after another bow took the seat to which the King pointed, then carefully wiped and adjusted his glasses.

After patiently waiting for these preliminaries to be finished, the King replied: “My dear Prime Minister, it is time the Princess Slimgrace was married.”

“Yes, most benign Sovereign,” returned the stately minister, “I was remarking the same thing to the Chief Barber and the Chief Shoe Buttoner just the other day.”

“Well, then,” continued the King, “what shall be decided upon for a fitting suitor’s contest?”

“Your Majesty, I find in this little book,” said the Minister opening one of his immense volumes, “numerous trials of love.”

“Read them,” commanded King Hadalongname.

“Killing a lion, slaying a giant, breaking iron gates—”

“Hold!” shouted the King. “These are all out of date. Haven’t you something more recent?”

“I regret deeply that I have not the pleasure of knowing anything modern,” answered the crestfallen minister, meekly.

“Then leave!” roared the King. The counsellor obeyed hastily, for by this time his majesty was in anything but an agreeable frame of mind.

And it was quite natural that he should feel extremely annoyed when his most trusted adviser showed such complete ignorance on this important subject. ‘Wild beasts to be killed! Wild fiddlesticks! There aren’t any but tame animals around anyway, and how should I know a suitor really killed a beast if I didn’t see him do it?”

Having delivered this convincing argument, the King ordered that all his chiefs, except the one just dismissed, should be summoned to assist him in his decision.

When they had all assembled he laid the matter before them, asking their opinions.

The Chief Barber thought eating a razor a trying little task, while the Chief Purveyor of Brushes judged the Prince who could count the bristles in 1000 brushes the most quickly would be the best successor to the King. The Chief Mathematician agreed to the latter suggestion, but the King was not pleased with either, and was beginning to scowl in a fearfully ferocious way when the Chief Cook spoke up.

“Your Majesty,” he said, “what could be more difficult than to get up a dinner with almost nothing to use and no money to buy anything, or none to speak of—say, a sixpence,” as he felt one in his pocket. “Then,” as he thought of his rye muffins which he had left in the oven, “a pocketful of rye, for instance.” And as a blackbird alighted in a tree near the window and began to chatter to its mate in its saucy way, he added: “Four and twenty blackbirds. Surely if anyone can do this he must have had a wise mother, and having had a wise mother, he will be likely to make a good husband.”

So much knowledge, and especially this last bit of wisdom, delighted the King, who ordered that the Cook should be made Chief Philosopher, and that the lovers’ contest should be announced in all the neighboring countries.

Few suitors came, for some had never handled so small a sum as a sixpence, others knew nothing about cooking and were too lazy to learn, and all were agreed that the feat was too difficult to attempt, even to obtain the hand of such a rich and beautiful young lady as the Princess Slimgrace. All were agreed, that is, all save one, Prince Lovliboy. He was not daunted in the least by the hard conditions separating him from his lady-love; for he and the Princess were old friends and were deeply in love with each other.

So he came to King Hadalongname’s palace, where he was to get up the dinner. Every day he laid snares for blackbirds until he had twenty-four. He then made a dough of rye and water, flavored with such spices as he could get for a sixpence. Into a pudding-dish he put this mixture, cooked it brown, then cut off the top, and slipped the birds in, and fastened the top on with bits of dough he had left for that purpose.

The time for the important dinner arrived at last. The Queen, who was exceedingly fond of bread and honey, finding that the Prince had not provided either of these articles of food, stayed out in the pantry, where she might indulge in them to her heart’s content. So there were only the Princess, the King and the Prince at the dinner. The great dish was set before the King. What was his surprise to see a flock of blackbirds fly out of it as he began to serve it.

He declared the Prince had won the Princess (to tell the truth, he wanted that Prince for his heir and successor), and went off to his counting-room to count his money to see how much he could give for the Princess’ dowry. The happy lovers went about the palace to be congratulated, but came across one poor maid who refused to share the general joyful feeling, for, said she, “While I was hanging out the clothes, one of those hateful little blackbirds snipped off my nose.”

THE FORGETFUL POET

 

By Ruth Plumly Thompson

Originally published in the Philadelphia Public Ledger, July 18, 1920.

Puzzle Corner

Last week’s verse, properly completed should read

There once was silly old Auk
Who loved dearly to lecture and talk—
The seals fell asleep
When the subjects grew deep,
The away the old fellow would stalk!

The bird was a toucan.

See what you can make of this:

WHAT BIRD?

A second cousin to the Auk—
A diving bird’s the -----
He’s fond of tea and relishes
The wild strawberry muffin!

Why is a house like a book?

With two letters of the alphabet you can make a word of two syllables meaning to surpass.

[Answers next time.] 

Copyright © 2016 Eric Shanower and David Maxine. All rights reserved.

SHE INSISTS ON HER BOARDERS KEEPING LENT WITH INDIFFERENT SUCCESS

By L. Frank Baum
Author of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, The Boy Fortune Hunters in the Yucatan, Daughters of Destiny, etc.
 
Originally published in the Aberdeen Saturday Pioneer, February 22, 1890.


“I suppose,” said the landlady, furtively eyeing an ink-stain on the carpet and smoothing the ample wrinkles out of her ample gown with her ample hands, “I suppose, gentlemen, as you’re all good ‘Piskipalians.”

The doctor colored, and answered, “I frequently attend that church, and—yes, I may say that I am an Episcopalian.”

“Ever sense that Jumper sociable!” remarked the landlady, sarcastically.

“I myself feel strongly drawn to that excellent—would you call it religion? Or sect? Or—“

“Call it the Guilded Clique!” chuckled the landlady, to the Colonel’s no small confusion.

“And Tom—“

“I was brought up in the tenets of the church,” replied that languid young man. “I don’t know what the tenets were, but I was brought up in ‘em.”

“Then they was probably red flannels an’ diapers,” answered the landlady, absent-mindedly, while Tom turned to the photograph of Susan B. to enable him to regain his self-possession. For poor Susan has always possessed herself.

“Therefore,” says the landlady, with a smile of satisfaction, “you are all ‘Piskiples. Of course you’ll keep lent.”

The boarders looked at each other in surprise and uneasiness.

“I think I shall deny myself something,” remarked the colonel; “I shall either smoke nickle cigars instead of imported ones or take to a pipe. I haven’t dicided which.”

“And I,” said the doctor, cheerfully, “shall economise on horse feed. My mare has really had too liberal an allowance of oats lately. What shall you do, Tom?” and they all looked curiously at the dyed-in-the-wool Episcopalian.

“Oh, there is one course of denial which I always follow,” says this interesting youth. “I deny myself postage stamps and write to all my friends on postals. It’s inconvenient, ye know, but the lenten season must be duly observed.”

The landlady smiled an Act III, Scene III smile, for the climax was approaching, and led them without a word to the dinner table.

“Mrs. Bilkins,” said the colonel, when all were seated. “I am a little rushed today, as I have a client awaiting my return to renew a note. Please fetch on the dinner.”

“The dinner,” replied the landlady, trying to repress a fiendish look of triumph, “is on. This is ash We’nsday. Most landladys who has ‘Piskiple boarders has nothin’ but ashes for to eat today, but I ain’t that sort. Good ‘Piskiples, as ‘tends the Guild socials so reglar, mustn’t be starved, altho’ they should be incouraged in them tenements o’ the church as Mr. Tom were brought up in. So I’ve got some nice mush an’ milk for you, and if your conscience don’t prick you,--fall to an’ eat hearty!”

The boarders were conquered. They turned their hollow eyes and mouths and pink suffused brows upon the mush, and naught save the rattle of the spoons against the bowls broke the ominous silence which was the only thing that had reigned in Aberdeen since winter set in.

“I once knew a woman,” remarked the colonel at last, spitefully, “so mean that she put holes in her fried-cakes to economise.”

“Did she die a horrible death?” asked Tom.

“She did.”

The landlady was unmoved.

“And an old woman with whom I boarded chopped her hash so fine that she had to press the atmosphere over the platter to keep it from floating in the air.”

“That was in lent,” beamed the landlady, good-naturedly.

Here the doctor distinguished himself.

“One good thing about this season,” said he, “is that boarding house keepers never ask you for any money, because they know it’s lent!”

Mrs. Bilkins turned pale, and left the room abruptly, while the boarders made the best of their meagre fare and started for town in a brighter mood.

The landlady looked after them through the crack in the kitchen door.

“It’ll be a heap o’ savin’ just now, this lent business; but I’m afeared,” with a sigh that came from the darns on the heels of her socks, “I’m afeared they’ll more n’ make it up at Yeaster!” 

THE FORGETFUL POET

 

By Ruth Plumly Thompson

Originally published in the Philadelphia Public Ledger, July 11, 1920. 

  

Puzzle Corner

You all seemed to know what was wrong with the dear chap’s verses last week and the animal referred to in his last poem was a bear. This week he would like you to finish this

Aukish Poem

There once was silly old Auk
Who loved dearly to lecture and -----?
The seals fell asleep
When the subjects grew -----?
The away the old fellow would -----?

And what bird is made up from a figure and an airtight container for food?

[Answers next time.]

Copyright © 2016 Eric Shanower and David Maxine. All rights reserved.

WHEN MOTHER BAKES A CAKE!

By Ruth Plumly Thompson
Author of The Hungry Tiger of Oz, Ozoplaning with the Wizard in Oz, and The Wish Express, etc.

Originally published in the Philadelphia Public Ledger, October 3, 1915.


Sometimes when Mary Ann goes out
And leaves us by ourselves—
Mother and John and I come down
And clean the kitchen shelves!

And after we have set the pans
All in a shining row
And make the kitchen tidy
John and I most always know

That mother’s going to bake a cake—
And don’t we run to get
The bowls and cups and sifting sieve
And sugar—well, YOU BET!!

And while she stirs the batter up
She’ll chuckle with a wink—
“Why don’t you children run out doors,
You’d want to, I should think!”

But John and I stick close as fur
And say we’d rather stay
Inside—because it’s much too hot
To romp about today!

Why, we wouldn’t miss the lickings,
John and I—for all the fun
A-going and we stick around
Until the cake is done!

For after we have scraped the bowl,
There’s still the icing pan,
And mother leaves so much in both—
We wonder how she can.

And when it’s in the oven
We just sit and sniff and sniff
And bounce about—and every now
And then—we ask her—if

She doesn’t think it’s done?
And she just smiles and says, “Not yet!”
You see, there’s always samples—
That we know we’re going to get!

Sometimes I wish that Mary Ann
Would go away and STAY!
’Cause then, perhaps, our mother’d make
A cake just every day!

THE FORGETFUL POET

 

By Ruth Plumly Thompson 

Originally published in the Philadelphia Public Ledger, July 4, 1920.

Summer Time Rhymes and Riddles

The river mentioned last week was Susquehanna, the cities Fez and Lima and the words left out of the Forgetful pome Emma and emulated.

A HAPPY DAY

I went to walk upon the lake,
And, oh, the air felt good!
And after that I went to row
Out in a little wood.

How sweet the oars sang in the brake,
How soft the breezes blew!
I shipped my birds, took out my pen
And wrote this pome for you.

(Very kind of the Forgetful Poet, I’m sure; but I’m afraid he’s mixed in his dictionary—or something.)

WHAT ANIMAL?

The name for a person who simply glories
In telling jokes and sleepy stories
Will give an animal—what’s more,
Fill out the rhyme and call him -----?

[Answers next time.]

Copyright © 2016 Eric Shanower and David Maxine. All rights reserved.

 

OZMA AND THE LITTLE WIZARD

By L. Frank Baum
Author of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, The Boy Fortune Hunters in the Yucatan, Daughters of Destiny, etc.

Illustrations by John R. Neill

Originally published 1913.

Once upon a time there lived in the beautiful Emerald City, which lies in the center of the fairy Land of Oz, a lovely girl called Princess Ozma, who was ruler of all that country. And among those who served this girlish Ruler and lived in a cozy suite of rooms in her splendid palace, was a little, withered old man known as the Wizard of Oz.

  

This little Wizard could do a good many queer things in magic; but he was a kind man, with merry, twinkling eyes and a sweet smile; so, instead of fearing him because of his magic, everybody loved him.

Now, Ozma was very anxious that all her people who inhabited the pleasant Land of Oz should be happy and contented, and therefore she decided one morning to make a journey to all parts of the country, that she might discover if anything was amiss, or anyone discontented, or if there was any wrong that ought to be righted. She asked the little Wizard to accompany her and he was glad to go.

“Shall I take my bag of magic tools with me?” he asked.

“Of course,” said Ozma. “We may need a lot of magic before we return, for we are going into strange corners of the land, where we may meet with unknown creatures and dangerous adventures.”

So the Wizard took his bag of magic tools and the two left the Emerald City and wandered over the country for many days, at last reaching a place far up in the mountains which neither of them had ever visited before. Stopping one morning at a cottage, built beside the rocky path which led into a pretty valley beyond, Ozma asked a man:

“Are you happy? Have you any complaint to make of your lot?”

And the man replied:

“We are happy except for three mischievous Imps that live in yonder valley and often come here to annoy us. If your Highness would only drive away those Imps, I and my family would be very happy and very grateful to you.”

“Who are these bad Imps?” inquired the girl Ruler.

“One is named Olite, and one Udent and one Ertinent, and they have no respect for anyone or anything. If strangers pass through the valley the Imps jeer at them and make horrid faces and call names, and often they push travelers out of the path or throw stones at them. Whenever Imp Olite or Imp Udent or Imp Ertinent comes here to bother us, I and my family run into the house and lock all the doors and windows, and we dare not venture out again until the Imps have gone away.”

Princess Ozma was grieved to hear this report and the little Wizard shook his head gravely and said the naughty Imps deserved to be punished. They told the good man they would see what could be done to protect him and at once entered the valley to seek the dwelling place of the three mischievous creatures.

 

Before long they came upon three caves, hollowed from the rocks, and in front of each cave squatted a queer little dwarf. Ozma and the Wizard paused to examine them and found them well-shaped, strong and lively. They had big round ears, flat noses and wide grinning mouths, and their jet-black hair came to points on top of their heads, much resembling horns. Their clothing fitted snugly to their bodies and limbs and the Imps were so small in size that at first Ozma did not consider them at all dangerous. But one of them suddenly reached out a hand and caught the dress of the Princess, jerking it so sharply that she nearly fell down, and a moment later another Imp pushed the little Wizard so hard that he bumped against Ozma and both unexpectedly sat down upon the ground.

At this the Imps laughed boisterously and began running around in a circle and kicking dust upon the Royal Princess, who cried in a sharp voice: “Wizard, do your duty!”

The Wizard promptly obeyed. Without rising from the ground he opened his bag, got the tools he required and muttered a magic spell.

Instantly the three Imps became three bushes—of a thorny stubby kind—with their roots in the ground. As the bushes were at first motionless, perhaps through surprise at their sudden transformation, the Wizard and the Princess found time to rise from the ground and brush the dust off their pretty clothes. Then Ozma turned to the bushes and said:

“The unhappy lot you now endure, my poor Imps, is due entirely to your naughty actions. You can no longer annoy harmless travelers and you must remain ugly bushes, covered with sharp thorns, until you repent of your bad ways and promise to be good Imps."

"They can’t help being good now, your Highness,” said the Wizard, who was much pleased with his work, “and the safest plan will be to allow them always to remain bushes.”

But something must have been wrong with the Wizard’s magic, or the creatures had magic of their own, for no sooner were the words spoken than the bushes began to move. At first they only waved their branches at the girl and little man, but pretty soon they began to slide over the ground, their roots dragging through the earth, and one pushed itself against the Wizard and pricked him so sharply with its thorns that he cried out: “Ouch!” and started to run away.

Ozma followed, for the other bushes were trying to stick their thorns into her legs and one actually got so near her that it tore a great rent in her beautiful dress. The girl Princess could run, however, and she followed the fleeing Wizard until he tumbled head first over a log and rolled upon the ground. Then she sprang behind a tree and shouted: “Quick! Transform them into something else.”

The Wizard heard, but he was much confused by his fall. Grabbing from his bag the first magical tool he could find he transformed the bushes into three white pigs. That astonished the Imps. In the shape of pigs—fat, roly-poly and cute—they scampered off a little distance and sat down to think about their new condition.

Ozma drew a long breath and coming from behind the tree she said:

“That is much better, Wiz, for such pigs as these must be quite harmless. No one need now fear the mischievous Imps.”

“I intended to transform them into mice,” replied the Wizard, “but in my excitement I worked the wrong magic. However, unless the horrid creatures behave themselves hereafter, they are liable to be killed and eaten. They would make good chops, sausages or roasts.”

But the Imps were now angry and had no intention of behaving. As Ozma and the little Wizard turned to resume their journey, the three pigs rushed forward, dashed between their legs, and tripped them up, so that both lost their balance and toppled over, clinging to one another. As the Wizard tried to get up he was tripped again and fell across the back of the third pig, which carried him on a run far down the valley until it dumped the little man in the river. Ozma had been sprawled upon the ground but found she was not hurt, so she picked herself up and ran to the assistance of the Wizard, reaching him just as he was crawling out of the river, gasping for breath and dripping with water. The girl could not help laughing at his woeful appearance. But he had no sooner wiped the wet from his eyes than one of the impish pigs tripped him again and sent him into the river for a second bath. The pigs tried to trip Ozma, too, but she ran around a stump and so managed to keep out of their way. So the Wizard scrambled out of the water again and picked up a sharp stick to defend himself. Then he mumbled a magic mutter which instantly dried his clothes, after which he hurried to assist Ozma. The pigs were afraid of the sharp stick and kept away from it.

“This won’t do,” said the Princess. “We have accomplished nothing, for the pig Imps would annoy travelers as much as the real Imps. Transform them into something else, Wiz.”

The Wizard took time to think. Then he transformed the white pigs into three blue doves.

“Doves,” said he, “are the most harmless things in the world.”

But scarcely had he spoken when the doves flew at them and tried to peck out their eyes. When they endeavored to shield their eyes with their hands, two of the doves bit the Wizard’s fingers and another caught the pretty pink ear of the Princess in its bill and gave it such a cruel tweak that she cried out in pain and threw her skirt over her head.

“These birds are worse than pigs, Wizard,” she called to her companion. “Nothing is harmless that is animated by impudent anger or impertinent mischief. You must transform the Imps into something that is not alive.”

The Wizard was pretty busy, just then, driving off the birds, but he managed to open his bag of magic and find a charm which instantly transformed the doves into three buttons. As they fell to the ground he picked them up and smiled with satisfaction. The tin button was Imp Olite, the brass button was Imp Udent and the lead button was Imp Ertinent. These buttons the Wizard placed in a little box which he put in his jacket pocket.

“Now,” said he, “the Imps cannot annoy travelers, for we shall carry them back with us to the Emerald City.”

“But we dare not use the buttons,” said Ozma, smiling once more now that the danger was over.

“Why not?” asked the Wizard. “I intend to sew them upon my coat and watch them carefully. The spirits of the Imps are still in the buttons, and after a time they will repent and be sorry for their naughtiness. Then they will decide to be very good in the future. When they feel that way, the tin button will turn to silver and the brass to gold, while the lead button will become aluminum. I shall then restore them to their proper forms, changing their names to pretty names instead of the ugly ones they used to bear. Thereafter the three Imps will become good citizens of the Land of Oz and I think you will find they will prove faithful subjects of our beloved Princess Ozma.”

“Ah, that is magic well worthwhile,” exclaimed Ozma, well pleased. “There is no doubt, my friend, but that you are a very clever Wizard."

THE FORGETFUL POET

 

By Ruth Plumly Thompson

Originally published in the Philadelphia Public Ledger, June 27, 1920. 

Puzzle Corner

The berries left out of last week’s verses were elderberry, mulberry, bilberry, gooseberry and blueberry, and all of them sound better in pie than poetry, I think; but the Forgetful Poet takes liberties with everything. The eland named Ella played well on the cello, or so he was told by a seafaring fellow.

Now he wants to know what Pennsylvania river has a little girl’s first name—last?

WHAT TWO CITIES?

A tassel on a Turkish hat
Gives a Moroccan city.
A certain bean will give another—
Guess them if you’re witty.
(The second is in the U.S.)

And just finish these lines.

THE STORY OF _____

There once was an emu named -----,
Who found herself in a dilemma
All the styles she created
Her friends -----
Alas for the emu named -----.

[Answers next time.]

Copyright © 2016 Eric Shanower and David Maxine. All rights reserved.

THE TALE OF TERRY TOM TURTLE

By Ruth Plumly Thompson
Author of The Royal Book of Oz, Ozoplaning with the Wizard of Oz, The Wish Express, "King, King! Double King!" etc.

Originally published in the Philadelphia Public Ledger, August 19, 1917.


Terry Tom Turtle was a good-hearted old bachelor marine who kept a salt shop down in the ocean bed. His salt taffies were known for miles ’round and all the fish and deep sea creatures patronized his shop. Of course, you know that the sea folks love salt just about as much as we love candy, so no wonder Tom had a pile of shells, which is sea talk for money. Every Saturday night Wilfred Whale bought a ton of salt taffy for his children and left five hundred little pink shells to pay for them, and every Saturday night Tom took those and all the other shells he had received during the week to Solomon Swordfish’s Interoceanical Bank, which was not only guarded by watch-dogfish, but by a company of swordfish soldiers. Terry Tom Turtle always felt easier in his mind after he had deposited his shells, because there are no end of robbers in the sea kingdom and a marauding band of octopuses had been operating in his neighborhood and grabbed about everything in sight.

So Tom, feeling quite contented and happy, stretched himself out to read the Seaweed Review and went to sleep so sound and fast that he never wakened up till 10 o’clock Monday morning and only wakened then because some one was hammering loudly upon the shop door. “Must be a customer!” yawned Tom, waddling across to the door. Tom, you know, was one of these huge big turtles, most six feet tall, that you have often see in pictures, so no wonder he waddles. Well, waddle or not, he got to the door and who should be there but Solomon Swordfish. “Robbers!” gasped Solomon, flopping over on one fin and rolling his eyes in toward his nose. “What?” shrieked Terry T. T. (you don’t mind if I abbreviate, I hope.) “Where are the watch-dogfish and the guard?” “G-ug-gone!” gurgled Solomon miserably.

At that Terry T. T.’s eyes snapped angrily and giving his shell a hitch, he plunged out of the shop. “Wait till I catch ’em!” he rumbled, swimming off to the bank as fast as he could go.

What a sight met Terry Tom’s gaze! Two frightful-looking monsters with tails extending up—up and out of sight—standing on their two hind legs pulling the shells and pearls and other precious property out of the safe deposit caves of the Interoceanical Bank. All the officials of the bank, the watch dogs and swordfish guard had retired to a twenty-yard distance and were watching the robbery with bulging eyes, but making no attempt to interfere. “Cowards!” hissed Terry Tom, cutting through the water like a submarine. Snap came his teeth against the leg of one of the monsters, but nothing happened. “Incased in shells!” mumbled Tom, swimming out of the way, “but they must have some soft spots and I’ll keep at ’em till I find ’em!” The monsters were much annoyed by the frequent rushes of Terry Tom. They consulted together a few minutes, then one of them pulled his tail—his own tail I mean—and taking up a piece of wood held it out toward the giant turtle. Scarcely seeing what he was doing Terry made another snap and this time his teeth closed on something soft. “I’ll never let go!” raged Tom, with his eyes fast shut. And he never did. For the next minute the monster began to rush upward through the water and as Tom was determined not to let go, he rushed along.

I wish this story had a different ending, for I hate to tell you that Tom ended in the soup. But that’s what happened and you might as well know it. As soon as the diver, for the monsters were divers, as I suppose you have guessed long ago—as soon as the diver reached the surface there was a loud whack, the last Tom ever felt, and the next day there was turtle soup for everybody on board. Pshaw! Too bad, but Tom should not have thought so much of his money, or rather his shells.

THE FORGETFUL POET

 

By Ruth Plumly Thompson

Originally published in the Philadelphia Public Ledger, June 20, 1920.

 

The Puzzle Corner

Before we start any further nonsense we had better answer last week’s riddles. Camp kit, peacock and Persian. Of course a cat would talk Persian if it really did talk.

Now this week the Forgetful Poet has decided to say it with berries, and all the blanks in the following verses may be filled in by berries, if you please:

My ----- sister has a dress
Of very finest -----
And goes to dances, while I stay
At home and find it dull!

She is eighteen and I am eight,
And then my brother -----
Hies off to camp, and I’m left out
Of that, which is worse still!

“Don’t be a -----,” my mother says.
“’Tis foolish to be -----!”
I’d give a lot to be a very
Little girl like you.

And can you finish this poem?

There was a young eland name Ella,
Who played very well on the -----
And made heaps of gold, so at least I was told
By a trustworthy, seafaring -----.

[Answers next time.] 

 

Copyright © 2016 Eric Shanower and David Maxine. All rights reserved.

THE CHINA TEA CUP

By Jack Snow
Author of The Magical Mimics of Oz, The Shaggy Man of Oz, Spectral Snow, etc.
 
Originally published in Dark Music and Other Spectral Tales, 1947.


Let the Bodhisattva look upon all things as having the nature of space—as permanently equal to space; without essence, without substantiality.—Saddharma Pundarika.

Mr. Deeping halted before the window of the musty little antique shop almost as if he had glimpsed an old acquaintance’s face inside. The window was grimy though lined with trickling streaks of relative cleanliness produced by a recent shower. Deeping’s gaze remained fixed, his eyes held tight to one tiny object among the conglomerate heap that shouted and struggled for preeminence in their dreary glass cell. It was a cup—a tea cup. It lay in a corner close to a yellow, warped set of books; a candelabra with eight sticks and a mournfully rusted sword hilt.

Deeping squinted through the dust and lowering twilight. Evidently the cup had figures on it, impossible to say what, for they were sadly obscured with thick grime. Unlovely and forlorn as was its appearance there was yet something about the tiny cup, something ephemeral, fragile that was thrillingly beautiful to Deeping. As he stood there he devoured its lines with his eyes. Thin as a leaf, delicate, bell-like he knew it would ring sweet and true if tapped. Like the tendril of a young green vine its slender handle leapt from the side and formed an oval scarcely large enough for the passage of a child’s little finger. It was like a dew drop crystallized and bestowed with immortality.

Deeping gazed a few minutes longer and then sighed with admiration and entered the shop where he purchased the cup for half a dollar and was in an agony of apprehension lest the ancient who attended him would allow the prize to slip from his trembling fingers and smash on the floor.

Deeping left the shop and was filled with a pleasant sense of exaltation—as if he had captured something irresistible to him, something enticingly fleeting. He carried his treasure in his right hand. At times he smoothed the crinkled wrapping paper reassuringly over its graceful surface. The evening was warm and soft—like velvet and spangled with peering stars. People passed usually in little groups of two or three conversing quietly. They were dressed lightly and their soft-toned words floated over the warm hush of the evening like oil poured into a goblet of amber colored nectar.

But Deeping neither saw these ghostly humans nor heard their low babble. He carried his head erect so that his gaze just missed the tops of the buildings and went on up to the stars and moon. He was happy tonight, his work at the office was finished. Now he was free, he had found a treasure, there was a full moon and a chance for a long ramble tonight. Ah—why not be happy? His eyes were kind when he smiled.

Now he was ascending the steps of a large brick building and making his way through dusky corridors to his rooms. They were in the far rear of the building where he could seclude himself with little or no danger of disturbance. And there were two windows free from the city’s skyline through which the dawn had more than once ebbed over the sill and painted the pages of Deeping’s book with grey fingers.

Deeping closed and locked the door and immediately unfolded the paper from the cup. He set about removing the grime from its surface—the task he had been anticipating in every pleasurable manner at each step of his homeward journey. From the faucet he drew a basin of luke warm water and into this he placed the cup and proceeded with elaborate care to rub the grease and dust from it by means of a soft bit of silk. Gently he bathed and polished. Finally the last clinging traces of grime had yielded to his persistence and he swathed the cup in a soft towel and dried it revelling the while in the deep lustre thus revealed. Sighing happily he seated himself at the table placing the cup before him and gazed voluptuously at it. It shone translucently with a thin bluish glow like the veins of the hand except where the painted figures occurred with their contrasting hues. And these figures— Deeping’s eyes glistened as he inspected them minutely for the first time. On one side of the cup appeared a huge scarlet blossom, a monster poppy, with a forest of tiny trees behind it. This was enough to absorb the most shrinking interest—this great six petalled staring flower with the background of pygmean giants; yet when Deeping turned the other side of the cup toward him he was even more intrigued and captivated. For on this side the flora representation had given way entirely to a swarm of fireflies—botaru.

These marvelous little insects were done exquisitely, Deeping saw, by a hand that must have been unbelievably tiny and adept. Although they spread over the side of the cup like a living cloud their lights were represented as they should have been—some green, some pale tea colored, some blue, and some so brilliant as to be white. Deeping recalled a fragment of Japanese poetry. He whispered it softly to the bare room.

“For the willow tree the season of budding would seem to have returned in the dark—look at the fireflies!”

For many minutes he sat in content dreaming and weaving many fantasies about his treasure. He tried to count the fireflies but he soon grew bewildered and gave it up. It was like lying on one’s back and trying to number the stars of a clear night. He wondered at the disproportion between the flower and the forest of trees. Perhaps this was some struggling artist’s mode of expressing revolt. Turning the tables as it were. Certainly the flower grew resplendently and the trees almost cowered. Sometimes the soul of man is such a flower, thought Deeping, blossoming out like a giant flora in the jungle, but usually it is so tiny, so fragile, so easily wilted—. Deeping paused in his fragmentary musing and listened to the clock strike ten.

Then he yawned and began the preparation of a bit of supper before bed. Cold meat he found in the refrigerator and tea was only the matter of a few minutes devoted to the heating of water. Presently his repast was before him. Cold beef, bread and butter and tea. He ate heartily, for so absorbed had he been in the allurements of the cup that he had entirely forgotten his evening meal. The tea tasted extraordinarily fine and Deeping was fond of it even at its worst. He had sipped two cups and was making ready to pour himself a third when a sudden forceful suggestion leapt at him, struck him, as confounding as it was startling. Certainly he had not thought of it—impossible. It came from somewhere else—somewhere outside. Like the pictures conjured by a caterwauling that breaks into one’s dreams and hurls them into the abyss of nightmares. It was blasphemous—it opposed all his ideals. Yet he was fascinated—powerless to resist. His hand was reaching slowly, as if by stealth to deceive his sensibilities, across the table toward the china cup. He grasped it, and lifted it toward him. His right hand had with a synchronizing movement raised the teapot and inclined it so that the spout was filled with the pale liquid. The cup was directly beneath the pot’s spout and with a groan Deeping felt his right hand tipping the pot still more. The pale tea flowed in a. clear stream until the cup was slightly over half full. Deeping replaced the tea pot and raised the cup to his lips. How exquisitely delicate was the sheer rim of the cup. Its pressure was scarcely perceptible to the lips. It was like drinking nectar that flowed from a faint pair of dream lips.

Deeping sipped in rapture for a moment and then as if finding the pleasure too great for him lowered the cup from his lips and gazed into it. And then he started and nearly dropped the cup from his trembling fingers. For gazing at him from the transparent yellow liquid was the image or reflection of a face not his own. He glanced about the room but he was alone. Trembling with the sudden shock he gazed again into the cup. It was the face of a girl—a beautiful girl and the reflection seemed to be that of a living face for the glow of life shone from the cheeks and the eyes were lighted with the flame of the spirit. Deeping’s emotions were curious. They passed analysis. He was frightened, bewildered, startled and thrilled. And none of these mental sensations predominated. He was a prey to all their talons at once. Reason became chaos. Panic awaited only the slightest cranny through which to slip and prance with cloven hoof to its own wild tunes.

Deeping threw out the tea, rinsed the cup and poured fresh tea. The face smiled up at him in no wise perturbed by his rudeness. Was it merely an hallucination? Then by what induced? He lifted his hand to his forehead; he had no fever; nor did he feel ill. He never drank. Cautiously he glanced again into the cup of tea. The surface of the liquid was free from ripples. It lay glassy clear, and there as perfectly as that formed in a mirror was the reflection of the girl’s face. Deeping gazed at her intently. Finally he spoke to her and even motioned with his hands but she was entirely unaware of his efforts although at moments which sent a sharp thrill through Deeping their eyes met in a sudden instantaneous glance.

Deeping wondered if the girl would be visible to others. But he could not endure that. What if she were not? What if they laughed at him? He would be mad—they would tell him so. And how could he disbelieve? He sat thinking, turning his mind first this way and then that, until the grey, misty dawn began to flow into the sky and then he nodded and slept unhappily in his chair.

After a few hours he awoke stiff and ill. With deliberate aim he avoided both visual and physical contact with the cup while washing and making himself ready for work. He was halfway out the door when he turned and stole back into the room. He walked uncertainly to the table where he had left the cup the night before and gazed full into it. His face paled—there she was. Her face calm and white as alabaster, her black hair mantled and devised as if for a cloudy background for her somber beauty. Her eyebrows curved into her forehead like twin question marks. Her full, broad lips awaiting were slightly parted. Her eyes, thin and narrow, were closed and their lashes lay like the fringe of a coverlet over her cheeks. She was sleeping. Deeping stood for a moment in awed silence and then turned and as silently left the room.

The next several weeks of Deeping’s life were composed of flashes of half disclosed ecstasy and long hours of throbbing, black misery. He had fallen in love. And it was with the image in the tea cup. His passionate, hopeless desire left him thin and wan and his eyes shone bright—. No longer did he seek to find a reason for or to explain away the image in the cup. He was not even disturbed nor surprised by it now. Such rational emotions were crowded from his mind by the glamor of love. He was cast about with a spell.

He purchased a little silver chest lined with silk and velvet and in this temple of idolatry he kept the cup. He found that the girl slept during his daytime and was awake at night; therefore, he reasoned, the original whose “projection” this was must dwell on the other side of the world. She might as well have dwelt in a golden castle on the farther side of the moon. She was unreachable, unattainable. At moments he wept, begged and implored her to come from the cup and present herself to him. But she did not, and the very consideration of her doing so sent Deeping into a trembling ecstasy of contemplation.

Many of Deeping’s nights were sleepless; indeed, the majority of them were, and his days were filled with the automatic discharge of his office work. He was aware only of the intense fire that was burning within him, of his love, his desire and the allure of the image. He had arrived at the point where reality was beginning to shade off into dreams, there was a wildness, a vagueness about things that seemed only natural to him.

One evening quite late he was sitting at the table just as he had been the first time he had seen the reflection. The little china cup was filled with tea, the flower bloomed unwillingly, the fireflies gleamed in their nebulous flight unceasingly. The warm soft summer air crept over the window sills and barely rustled the thin draperies with its delicate intrusion. Outside the moon had begun waning after the voluptuous fullness of the night before. People walked about on the pavements below and muttered. Occasionally one spoke louder than his companion and once someone shouted. Deeping stared haggardly into the cup. His lips moved and his tongue crept over them and in and out of his mouth. Suddenly his eyes gleamed like coals in a hot furnace; he leapt to his feet seizing the cup between his palms. His mouth twitched and his face blanched deathly white as he lifted the cup to his lips and drank its contents to the last drop. He stared into the cup. It was empty. He poured it full of tea. Only the thin depth of the pale liquid glimmered up at him. Deeping laughed, a queer strained laugh. His hair crept back on his scalp and he shivered as if chilled with a sudden spray. His face was grey and its lines drawn taut with emotion and desire pulling on one end and Reason struggling on the other. His laughter grew shriller—it convulsed him so that he shook and tottered under its weight. He tore off his clothing and threw himself on the bed. He was laughing, sobbing, the wild laughter of despair.

Sleep closed about him almost immediately. It was as if a greedy animal had devoured him, leaving him no time for the reflection that ordinarily precedes slumber. Then came oblivion—deep silence—oblivion and blackness. For ages endless and viewless he seemed to lie in blackness, lost and drenched in its murky waters. Gradually he rose to the surface. Was it quite blackness? Was not that a rift, a break? Ah! now it grew more distinct—a peculiar silver fluffiness. It was night, to be sure, and there were storm clouds and the sky was black as ink. Now it was breaking even more; near the center it seemed to be suffused with a dim nebulous glow; a ghostly light such as is cast into the sky of a clear night by the myriad pinpoint gleamings of the milky way. And there surrounded in this phantom light was a figure—a human figure. It was she. For the first time the beauty of her body was revealed to him. Supple and tender she was like the branch of a young green tree and full of grace and promise. He lifted his eyes to her face. It shone, gleamed like a star in the fury of its first fire. Her face was troubled and her lips moved as if she were speaking to him.

He strained his ears and listened intently. Her voice came to him from a remote distance; she might have stood in infinity—her words could have been no feebler nor thinner. He was tortured for fear he would lose them altogether; his effort to catch the faintest vibration was weakening, intense. And there were long spaces—pauses be-tween the words that caused him an agony of suspense.

She seemed to waver, to fade away and then return like a low nocturnal wind. At moments her form grew misty and dissolved almost completely away in the dark somber billows. Deeping’s brow was covered with perspiration.

“You have done a great wrong,” she said with infinite sadness and pity in her voice—pity for him. “You have swallowed my soul, my double that has lived and will live through all ages.” She hesitated, and Deeping was suddenly seized with a nameless horror and dread of the pity and enigmatical tenderness of her face. “You must die,” she added softly, “by your own will. It is the only way my soul can be released.” She sobbed and Deeping saw tears of pity drop from her eyes like soft rain from the clouds.

She was gone. Only the black sky with its thick gloomy clouds remained. Deeping turned in his bed as if to shut out the sight of it and groaned.

The woman who cared for Deeping’s rooms came the next morning, letting herself in with her key and found Deeping fully dressed arid stretched on the floor dead. She did not lose her head nor behave foolishly as women generally do in the presence of unexpected and unaccounted for death but immediately summoned a doctor who could do no more than lay the death to mercurial poisoning. Evidently Deeping had awakened, dressed himself and swallowed the mercury tablets during the night. His face was considerably distorted.

Since Deeping had no relations and apparently no close friends the landlady phoned Mr. Groves, Deeping’s superior at the office. Groves arrived a short time after he was called. The doctor had gone. He sat alone in the little room with the body. It had been laid on the bed and a spread draped over it. Groves gazed at the white shape outlined on the bed with a melancholy fixity. He would miss Deeping but he felt no real grief or sorrow because j of his death. He had been a good worker, a capable I helper, but a man of little power, little personality. He might have been called timid. And certainly he should have had friends or someone to take charge in a case like this. Groves felt that this was slightly overstepping the bounds of business courtesy.

Groves sighed and began a minute inventory of the room’s furnishings. However, there was no great pleasure in checking and appraising so meanly fitted a, room as this. His gaze settled on the table by his chair where stood a teapot with a cup beside it. Groves poured himself a cup of the cold tea. After enjoying one or two sips of the liquid he lowered the cup and gazed in curiosity at its odd design.

But his curiosity changed to horror the next instant and the cup slipped from his fingers and smashed into fragments on the floor. For there glimmering up at him from the depths of the yellow liquid was the image of Deeping’s face and pressed close to his own their lips meeting in a passionate caress was that of a girl with black hair and high, thin eyebrows.

THE FORGETFUL POET

 

By Ruth Plumly Thompson

Originally published in the Philadelphia Public Ledger, June 13, 1920.

The Puzzle Corner

The nicknames for the people of the states mentioned last week were: Hoosiers, Indiana; Foxes, Maine; Tar Heels, North Carolina; Panhandlers, West Virginia; Web Feet, Oregon; Fly-Up-the-Creeks, Florida, and Beaneaters, Massachusetts.

The words omitted from the little verse about the Lizard—were Lizzie and all.

All campers are in need of it.
(A pet name for a cat?) Yes -----?

A vegetable and fowl ’twill take
To give this bird, and no mistake?
What bird?

What language would a kitten speak if it talked?

NONSENSE RHYMES

For you to finish.

There once was a turtle named -----
Who managed the Meadowville ferry.
He never was late nor made customers -----
So he grew very rich and quite -----?

[Answers next time.]

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