Volume XL
A FEW LITTLE DURNS.
In writing this thunder
These sermons and rhymes
I have to think "dammit"
A good many times.
But since that is cussing,
A fellow soon learns
To make out with only
A few little durns.
In reading the papers
And watching the mess
The leaders are making,
And all the distress,
I get so dura fretted,
And tickled in turns,
I just have to let out
A few little durns.
No matter how tretted
And angry I am,
I always remember
To never say dam.
But, oh, when my spirit
With righteous wrath burns,
I need in my business
v A few little durns.
The durn politicians,
And sky-pilots, too
The leaders oi fashion,
And all the durn crew
The gait they are going
Most fittingly earns"
The impressive rebuke of
A few little durns.
Just "durn" isn't cussing,
In moderate use
No more than a snow-bird
Is part of a goose.
When used by a man who
For righteousness yearns,
I hope there's no harm in
A few little durns.'
Dear reader, be patient
I know it sounds rough;
But I am the fellow
That's writing this stuff.
I know what is needed
In these-here concerns,
And you must allow me
A few little durn3.
You can't change the . devil
intoa saint by sprinkling holy-
water on his tail.
Boomer, North Carolina, March, 1922.
PEACE IS A GREAT THING
NOW
Gee-whillikins!
Talk about quick-change art
ists !
But you just ought to look at
the hang-taked plute preachers.
During 1917 and 1918 every
doggon D. D. in the country was
out whooping his blamed head
off for the war. , He went about
preaching "patriotic sermons
and telling the people what a
holy" cause it was and how
they must go and fight and die
for it.
Yes, fight!
Kill!
Slay!
Butcher!
It was God's will so they
said.
x The command, "Thou shalt
not kill," was forgotten.
The Prince of Peace was for
gotten.
And if any man dared to
stand up for the principles of
Jesus, the confounded preachers
were the first ones to yell,
"Crucify him!"
It was awful what a bad thing
peace was in those days.
But now look!
And listen!
rrom every glided puipn m
the land combes . one continual
monotonous stream of hypocrit
ical peace talk.
Well, I don't object to peace
talk.
I wish there was more of it.
But what I want to know is
why didn't these same mealy
mouthed "servants of God" talk
that way four years aso?
If peace is a good thing now
it was a good thing then. . .
You know why.
They were confounded sneak
ing cowards, and hynocrites as
well. They wanted to stand in
with the Big Ikes in order to
save their own fancy hides.
They didn't have the courage
to stand with Jesus and go to
jail with Debs.
But now when the tide has
turned, and it seems to be popu
lar to alk- for peaces Je-ru-salem!
what peace advocates
the dear old D. D.'s are!
Most reverently and prayer
fully I say it
Durn such preachers !
THE ROMAN MUD-GOD
They have had another big
spree over in Rome. And right
here is just as good a place as
any to tell you about it.
You know they keep a little
deputy god over there to tell the
Creator how to run the universe,
and to forgive the sins of good
Pappycrats who want to play
hell and pay for it.
This little deputy god claims
that he has all power on earth
and in heaven, and" even tries
to exercise authority as far a
way as Texas.
The Pappy of Rome is always
an old dried-up Dacneior, so
skinny and ugly that he looks
liKe tne running-gears oi a
witch. But they let him live in
a palace bigger and finer than
Solomon ever dreamed of, and
he could hire Rockefeller to tote
holy water to wash his infallible
hoofs. And when he takes a dip
of snuff the pappycrats all over
the earth begin to sneeze like
their blamed heads would come
off. All of which seems to
prove that he is. the real tar
baby that Saint Peter found in
the woods.
But just a few weeks ago this
powerful assistant deputy mud
god of ail creation woke up one
morning with a dark blue pain in
the central , hemisphere of his
night-gown, about half-way be
tween his infalibility and his ap
petite. And now, Mister Madam, if
you want to know what happens
when an all-powerful mud-god
gets a pain in his old fermented
belly, you just ought to have
been there. In less time than it
takes to tell it the whole hill was
working alive -with pappycrat
doctors, each with his hamper-
sack full of Punk Powders for!
j Pale Popes, and .all ready to in
sert their little funnels and pour
double-distilled desolation into
the belly of a groaning god.
9 It imist have been a curious
sight. There lay an old skinny
man who claimed to have all
power on earth and in heaven,
and yet he didn't have power
enough to manage his own gut-
t works and keep from getting
-1 All! I! !
sick. Ana tnere at nis glided
bed-side stood forty or fifty
goat-whiskered M. D.'s all try -
Number 12.
ing to Keep tne old teller out
of the grave.
"Power" indeed! As
well
might a doodle-bug claim that
he could operate a coal-mine.
There probably wasn t much
the matter with the old codger
at the start. A big dose of
salts and a 48-hour fast would
very likely have straightened
him out all right. But the doc
tors kept on pumping dope in
to him till they finally straight
ened him out on a plank. I
have a strong suspicion that
they just filled him so full of
medicine f;that he busted. But
after he was dead nobody could
tell' that he looked jany more
powerful than any other dead
man. They cut a few big fan
dangoes around him and hauled
him off to the bone-yard. Thus
ended the career of Rome's
great deputy-god.
But the stars kept their places
in the heaven. The feun con
tinued to shine. The "end of
time" didn't come. Which was
all very strange in view of the
fact that the earth had to do
without a deputy-god for near
ly a week before the cardinals
could get their god-factory;,
started and make another one.
It must be a fact, after all, that
there is a God somewhere else
oesiaes m Koine wno nas some
thing to do with running things
And it causes heretics like me
to wonder if the world wouldn't
have rocked along just the same
if the icardinals had never got
another pope made.
I believe it would.
But the papycrats were not
willing to risk it, nohow. They
got the holy oil can and oiled
up their god-factory, then pour
ed a lot cardinals into the hop
per, and one of them came out
a brandnew deputy god, looking
just as infallible as a fodder
stack.
So everything is all hunky for
awhile longer, I guess till this
one gets a pain in his belly.
Miss Winifred Stoner, the
wonder girl" who speaks twelve
languages, has just been married
to a Frenchman who speaks
seventeen languages. There is
sure to be trouble. If they can't
find anything to quarrel about
! m one language they are mighty
apt to m anotner.