Page:Wit, humor, and Shakspeare. Twelve essays (IA cu31924013161223).pdf/29

 diamonds upon window-panes, makes one of his characters say: "One man goes to foolscap, another to a pane of glass. They may be very different people; but, well considered, I doubt if the motive hasn't the same source." "At least, the same effect," is the reply; "for, as my friend Laman Blanchard sings,—

"''Tis oft the poet's curse To mar his little light with verse.'"

In the same way a classic line which is quoted in mimicry of a modern situation can raise the surprise of a pun. The very best instance, perhaps, of this felicity was the quotation of Dean Swift when a lady's long train swept down a fine fiddle and broke it. He cried out,—

"Mantua væ miseræ nimium vicina Cremonæ!"

Sporting with words blew aside a little the powder-smoke of the battle of Shiloh, and etherized the pain of one of our soldiers, whose cheek and chin had been carried away by a shot. "What can we do for you?" asked his comrades. "Boys," said he, with what articulation was left to him, "I should like a drink of water mighty well, if I only had the face to ask for it."

A very good pun can be made unconsciously, as when the schoolmaster asked the class what Shylock meant when he said, "My deeds upon my head." "Well," said one of the boys, "I don't know, unless he carried his papers in his hat." In the same way, Lord Dundreary makes a good pun because he can only comprehend one