The philosopher may be calm, even while his foot is awakening from a sound sleep; the poet may not lose his inspiration even with a hair in his mouth; but to plain John W. Smith, of 101 Eighth Avenue, a kripsle is as disturbing as a broken elbow, or a bleeding poached egg in its death agony. (See Slub.)
Perhaps you think that smile you caught,
Her introspective air,
Her pensive mien—is caused by thought
Too shy for you to share.
Ah, so it is! With all your tact
You fail. It is no use!
For she is kripsled by the fact
That her left garter’s loose.
Lal´li-fac-tion, n. A verbose story, a joke repeated.
Lal´li-fy, v. 1. To act too slowly; to delay. 2. To give an over-painstaking or super-elaborate performance.
Did you ever hear an Englishman lallify his conversation with, “What I mean to say is this,” and “if you know what I mean” and “do you see”? So the shop girl lallifies her talk with “Listen here!” or “Say, listen!” while she gropes for an idea. The preacher, barren of fresh thoughts, lallifies his meager sermon. “Fourthly, beloved brethren—” (See Drillig.)
A “talky” play is lallified till the house walks out. Like a song sung too slowly, so is the lallified talk of the young man who doesn’t want to escort that particular girl home. (See Vorge and Xenogore.)
The lallified book: Wide, wide margins and thick, thick paper—or, maybe it is lallified only with adjectives or adverbs.
Have you ever heard that man Gerrish tell his favorite story, lallifying it with dialect-dialogue till you yawned? Then, after you have forced a laugh, he lallifies the point with reminiscent unction, repeating it reflectively, itching for more applause.
The consummate lallification is two women saying good-bye to each other. (See Wumgush.)