A Student's Love Letter

1895

The apiarist, as well we know,
Will always like the B's.
The sailor never will outgrow
His ardent love for C's.

The millionaire, with pockets full,
His E's will ever prize.
Coquettish maidens find a joy
In always making I's.

Surveyors, bound close by a chain,
Must in the L believe,
While preachers look in for the N,
When one must sing or grieve.

Collectors take care of the O's,
And farmers of the P's.
The actors follow up the Q's,
And ladies love the T's.

Professors, men of letters grand,
To all the Y's are true,
And I, why don't you know, sweetheart,
That I'm dead stuck on you?

— Atlanta Journal.

Art of Writing Very Old

1910

New Discoveries Carry Back Existence of Written Documents Centuries Beyond Phoenician Record

The revelations made at the remains of a great prehistoric palace at Knossos, in Crete, which is believed to be the original of the fabled "Labyrinth," would seem to carry back the existence of written documents on Greek soil some eight centuries beyond the earliest known monuments of Greek writing and five centuries beyond the earliest dated Phoenician record as seen on the Moabite stone.

These discoveries, therefore, place the whole question of the origin of writing on a new basis. It is thought that the Cretan hieroglyphs exactly correspond with what, in virtue of their names, we must suppose to have been the pictorial originals of the Phoenician letters on which the alphabet is based.

Among these are Aleph, the ox's head; Beth, the house; Daleth, the door, and so forth. This contravenes the old theory of De Rouge that the Phoenician letters were derived from early Egyptian forms signifying quite different objects.

Some Burdensome Names

1914

Perhaps the most burdensome name ever given to a child was to the daughter of Arthur Pepper in 1882. It comprised one name for every letter of the alphabet, in this way: Anna Bertha Cecilia Diana Emily Fanny Gertrude Hypatia Inez Jane Kate Louise Maud Nora Ophelia Quince Rebecca Starkey Teresa Ulysis Venus Winifred Xenophon Yetty Zeno, P of course provided in the surname, Pepper.

Hundreds of examples of this poor form of parental wit occur in the entries for the past few years Noah's Ark Smith, Sardine Box, Jolly Death, Judas Iscariot Brown, One-too-Many Johnson, Not-Wanted Smith, Bovril Simpson, Merry Christmas Figgett, Odious Heaton, Anno Domini Davis, are the names of children probably living who will have to bear them through life, unless they wash themselves clean with subterfuge.

There was for a long time a curiosity in nomenclature on the Australian pension list. His name was "Through-much-tribulation-we-enter-the-Kingdom-of-Heaven Smith." But the officials of the Pension department very pardonably abbreviated him into Tribby Smith."

It is not surprising that the names of Dickens' characters — odd though they are — should be found in real life, for it was from life that many of them were taken. Some, as we know, were copied from the names over shop doors, etc, but this was not the novelist's only source of selection. Among his papers John Forster found carefully drawn up lists of names, with the source from which he obtained them and the longest lists were those drawn from the "Privy Council Education Lists." Some of the names thus noted are too extravagant for anything but reality — Jolly Stick, Bill Marigold, George Muzzle, William Why, Robert Gospel, Robin Scrubbam, Sarah Goldsacks, Catherine Two, Sophia Doomsday, Rosetta Dust, Sally Gimblett!

Rhymeinate – By J. C. C. Paterson (alphabet poetry)

1908

Click the image for larger version.




RHYMEINATE.

BY J. C. C. PATERSON

What do you think the sailor ate?
Why, nothing more nor less than bait,
Which some one left in an old crate
Of very long-forgotten date.
Then with his head and heart elate,
He cried, "I mind not any fate,"
And firmly walked out past the gate.
But a Turkish Khan, with ardent hate,
At this saying grew irate.
And said, "He shall not jubilate
While I am Khan of this Khanate;
And though it now may be too late,
On board my yacht I'll make him mate;
And should he there his lies narrate,
Or to my crew try to orate,
With a capstan-bar I'll break his pate,
And hang him up on a board quadrate;
And then to my subjects I'll relate,
In an address on affairs of state,
That this man had one serious trait,
Which would tend to underrate
The nation's honor, and make vibrate
The lives of all, so I couldn't Wait
So long as the life of a Xerobate
To throw him down from the minaret yate,
Or give him a dose of zirconate.