CHAPTER XIII
EXTRACTS FROM THE DICTIONARY OF A CYNIC
(After Jules Noriac)
Alabaster—Kind of beautiful white marble, so much used in novels for ladies' necks and shoulders that very little is left for ordinary consumption. Very rare now in the trade, still very common in poetry.
Alibi—An aunt for wives; the club for husbands.
Ardour—Heat, extreme and dangerous. Those who gamble with ardour ruin their families; those who work with ardour ruin their health; those who study with ardour go to a lunatic asylum; those who love with ardour get cured more quickly than others.
Argus—Domestic spy. Juno gave him a cow to look after. With his hundred eyes he did not find out that the cow was no other than a woman, Io.
Attraction—Force which tends to draw bodies to each other. Isaac Newton thought he had discovered the principle of universal attraction when he watched an apple fall. Eve had discovered it five thousand years earlier.
Austerity—Self-control which enables a man or a woman to receive a call from Cupid without inviting him to stay to dinner.