【英文原著类】The Foolish Dictionary(愚蠢的词典).pdf

The Foolish Dictionary
The Foolish Dictionary
by Gideon Wurdz
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The Foolish Dictionary
CHAPTER I
Distilled waters run deep.
ABSINTHE From two Latin words, ad, and sinistrum, meaning "to
the bad." If in doubt, try one. (Old adage, "Absinthe makes the jag last
longer)."
ABSTINENCE From the Persian ab, water, and stein, or tankard.
Hence, water tankard, or "water wagon."
ACCESSION A beheading process by which you may either win or
lose a political job. Old spelling, Axe-session.
ACCIDENT A condition of affairs in which presence of mind is
good, but absence of body better.
ADAMANT From "Adam's Aunt," reputed to be a hard character.
Hence, anything tough, or hard.
ADORE From add, annex, and ore, meaning wealth. Example,
foreign nobles who marry American heiresses adore them. ADVICE A
commodity peddled by your lawyer and given away by your mother-in-
law, but impossible to dispose of yourself. Famous as the one thing
which it is "More blessed to give than receive." GOOD ADVICE
Something old men give young men when they can no longer give them a
bad example.
ADVERSITY A bottomless lake, surrounded by near-sighted friends.
plimentary term for your husband or your wife.
Sometimes a synonym for "Your finish."
AFTERTHOUGHT A tardy sense of prudence that prompts one to
try to shut his mouth about the time he has put his foot in it.
AGE Something to brag about in your wine-cellar and forget in a
birth-day book. The boast of an old vintage, the bug a boo of an old
maid.
ALCOHOL A liquid good for preserving almost everything except
secrets.
ALDERMAN A political office known as the Crook's Road to
Wealth. From Eng. all, and Greek derma, meaning skin--"all skin."
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The Foolish Dictionary
ALIMONY An expensive soothing syrup, prescribed by the judge
for a divorcee's bleeding heart. (Old spelling, allay money).
ALLOPATHY From Eng. all, everybody, and Grk. pathos, pain.
Pain for everybody. HOMOEOPATHY From Grk. homoios, same,