"Edgar Allen Poe - The Works of Edgar Allan Poe Volume 4" - читать интересную книгу автора (Poe Edgar Allan)

evidently exerting himself to the utmost. Every now and then one
might catch a glimpse of the scoundrel through the smoke. There he
sat in the belfry upon the belfry-man, who was lying flat upon his
back. In his teeth the villain held the bell-rope, which he kept
jerking about with his head, raising such a clatter that my ears ring
again even to think of it. On his lap lay the big fiddle, at which he
was scraping, out of all time and tune, with both hands, making a
great show, the nincompoop! of playing "Judy O'Flannagan and Paddy
O'Rafferty."

Affairs being thus miserably situated, I left the place in disgust,
and now appeal for aid to all lovers of correct time and fine kraut.
Let us proceed in a body to the borough, and restore the ancient
order of things in Vondervotteimittiss by ejecting that little fellow
from the steeple.

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LIONIZING

-------- all people went
Upon their ten toes in wild wonderment.

--_ Bishop Hall's Satires_.

I AM - that is to say I was - a great man; but I am neither the
author of Junius nor the man in the mask; for my name, I believe, is
Robert Jones, and I was born somewhere in the city of Fum-Fudge.

The first action of my life was the taking hold of my nose with
both hands. My mother saw this and called me a genius: my father wept
for joy and presented me with a treatise on Nosology. This I mastered
before I was breeched.

I now began to feel my way in the science, and soon came to
understand that, provided a man had a nose sufficiently conspicuous
he might, by merely following it, arrive at a Lionship. But my
attention was not confined to theories alone. Every morning I gave my
proboscis a couple of pulls and swallowed a half dozen of drams.

When I came of age my father asked me, one day, If I would step
with him into his study.

"My son," said he, when we were seated, "what is the chief end of
your existence?"

"My father," I answered, "it is the study of Nosology."