PROBOSCIS, n. The rudimentary organ of an elephant which serves him
in place of the knife-and-fork that Evolution has as yet denied him.
For purposes of humor it is popularly called a trunk.
Asked how he knew that an elephant was going on a journey, the
illustrious Jo. Miller cast a reproachful look upon his tormentor, and
answered, absently: "When it is ajar," and threw himself from a high
promontory into the sea. Thus perished in his pride the most famous
humorist of antiquity, leaving to mankind a heritage of woe! No
successor worthy of the title has appeared, though Mr. Edward bok, of
_The Ladies' Home Journal_, is much respected for the purity and
sweetness of his personal character.
-- Ambrose Bierce, "The Devil's Dictionary"
MONAD, n. The ultimate, indivisible unit of matter. (See
_Molecule_.) According to Leibnitz, as nearly as he seems willing to
be understood, the monad has body without bulk, and mind without
manifestation -- Leibnitz knows him by the innate power of
considering....
HADES, n. The lower world; the residence of departed spiri he
place where the dead live.
Among the ancients the idea of Hades was not synonymous with our
Hell, many of the most respectable men of antiquity residing there in
a very comfortable kind of way....
