ABDICATION, n. An act whereby a sovereign attests his sense of the
high temperature of the throne.
Poor Isabella's Dead, whose abdication
Set all tongues wagging in the Spanish nation.
For that performance 'twere unfair to scold her:
She wisely left a throne too hot to hold her.
To History she'll be no royal riddle --
Merely a plain parched pea that jumped the griddle.
G.J.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
high temperature of the throne.
Poor Isabella's Dead, whose abdication
Set all tongues wagging in the Spanish nation.
For that performance 'twere unfair to scold her:
She wisely left a throne too hot to hold her.
To History she'll be no royal riddle --
Merely a plain parched pea that jumped the griddle.
G.J.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
Related:
- INTENTION, n. The mind's sense of the prevalence of one set of
influences over another set;
an effect whose cause is the imminence, immediate or... - CABBAGE, n. A familiar kitchen-garden vegetable about as large and
wise as a man's head.
The cabbage is so called from Cabagius, a prince who... - HOSTILITY, n. A peculiarly sharp and specially applied sense of the
earth's overpopulation.
Hostility is classified as active and passive; as (respectively)... - LAUREATE, adj. Crowned with leaves of the laurel. In England the
Poet Laureate is an officer of the sovereign's court,
acting as dancing skeleton at every royal feast and... - WEAKNESSES, n.pl. Certain primal powers of Tyrant Woman wherewith she
holds dominion over the male of her species,
binding him to the service of her will and paralyzing... - MUMMY, n. An ancient Egyptian, formerly in universal use among modern
civilized nations as medicine,
and now engaged in supplying art with an excellent... - SCARABEE, n. The same as scarabaeus.
He fell by his own hand
Beneath the great oak tree.
He'd traveled in a foreign land. He... - PLEBISCITE, n. A popular vote to ascertain the will of the sovereign.
Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's... - PREROGATIVE, n. A sovereign's right to do wrong.
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Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's...
