BENJAMIN BASHFUL
ON
THE VICE OF PUNNING.
Who's he, that from our board is running?
He, Sir's an enemy to punning,
A bashful foe, who loves not wit—
Ergo, because he's none of it
Within his cranium; and at table
Sits like the fox in Æsop's fable,
Watching the grapes he'd fain devour,
And disappointed, calls them sour.
A laugh would decompose his metal,
And like a dog, with a tin kettle
Dangling at his tail, he runs
From witty wags who deal in puns.
TO BERNARD BLACKMANTLE, ESQ.
Sir,
It has just been communicated to me, that you are about to collect and publish a Punster's Pocket-Book, for the express purpose of promoting that pernicious vice, which is already much too prevalent. As an antidote to the evil, I hope you will not fail to insert this my special protest.
B. BASHFUL.
I am a bashful young man of good fortune, who, to use the phrase of the mode, have just come out, and made my entré into the world with the reputation of being a gentleman and a scholar. I could wish you to notice a minor evil in society which tends to poison the springs of taste and knowledge, by bringing forward the flippant, and throwing back the reflective, speaker. I allude to the vice of punning, which tends to destroy all the profit and pleasure of conversation, and embarrass, in the greatest degree, the young and inexperienced.