Chapter II: Part 2

Wait a minute--I forgot the man who practices the trombone or the cornet, just across the airshaft--that’s a gollohix to dream about!

_A New Year’s Eve in gay New York,
Fire engines at a fire,
A parrot that doth squawk and squawk
Are gollohixes dire._

_If gollohixes all could be
Escaped, I’d thank my stars,
But Gollohix the Great is he
Who snores in sleeping-cars!_

=Go-lob-ri-fac´tion=, _n._ 1. An object which has suffered
extravagant decoration. 2. A composition superspiced with
adjectives.

=Go-lob-ri-fac´tu-rer=, _n._ A mad architect, or designer.

=Go-lob´ri-fy=, _v._ To adorn excessively; to add excruciating and
unmeaning ornament.

Golobrifaction is the extravagant exaggeration of art. One may golobrify pastry, jellies, salads; or literature, with decadent phrases.

Golobrifaction is the art of supersweetening, or the flourish of eccentric adornment. (See _Diabob_.)

Topiary gardening golobrifies the country residence of the aristocrat; humbler abodes are golobrified with cast iron stags or plaster statues of nervous nymphs.

The lover golobrifies his _billets doux_ with ardent adverbs. The ambitious builder golobrifies his villas with the fret-saw and the turning-lathe. (See _Gorgule_.)

Trading-stamp furniture, Spencerian flourishes, imitation castles, parsley decorations, notched turnips, oranges and radishes, cheap picture-frames, perfumery bottles, boars’ heads, fishes with tails in their mouths, gingerbread men--all are golobrifactions.

The wedding cake of the millionaire is a golobriboblifaction. _Art nouveau_ would require still another syllable. After all, is there much difference between a valentine and a formal Italian garden?

_Her gown it was golobrified
With flounces, tucks and shirrs,
With laces trimmed, with ribbons tied,
With buttons, fringe and furs._

_Like unnamed tropic bird her look,--
For, putting Art in action,
Her spouse, a famous pastry cook,
Made that golobrifaction!_

=Gor´gule=, _n._ 1. An unwished-for gift; an unnecessary,
splendiferous object. 2. Elaborate bad taste.

=Gor´gu-lous=, _a._ Ornamental, but not useful.

A gorgule is the imitation malachite clock, the fancy brass lamp, the green plush sofa, gorgulous with curves, writhing spirals, tassels, gimp and fringe. (See _Diabob_.)

A hand-embroidered necktie is a gorgule. So are lacy, frilled, beribboned boudoir-caps, without any boudoir; and fancy smoking jackets; and corset-covers with chiffon roses, theatrical act drops and scenic interiors,--anything too royal for humble use. (See _Golobrifaction_.)

Most wedding presents are gorgules. “Heavens, I wish someone would break that!” Need one describe the gorgule? A brass-and-onyx prodigy. A celluloid toilet set, in a plush casket, a chandelier of the epoch of 1880, a silver-plated ice-pitcher, or a set of lemonade-tumblers in colored glass. (See _Gefoojet_.)

Ever receive a loving-cup, grand and gorgulous? Once you were proud of it; now you’re willing to have the children lug it to the seashore and shovel it full of sand. Why did you subscribe for that large folio _edition de luxe_ “Masterpieces of Foreign Art,” a gorgule in nine monstrous volumes--price $85.75?

Don’t forget that eiderdown fan. It’s a gorgule. Give it to the cook.

_Behold this gorgulated chair--
A weird, upholsterrific blunder!
It doesn’t wonder why it’s there,
So don’t encourage it to wonder;_

_For Gorgules such as this don’t know
That they’re impossible, and therefore
They go right on existing, so
This is the whyness of their wherefore._

=Gorm=, _n._ A human hog; a practical egoist.

=Gorm=, _v._ To take or desire more than one’s proper share; to act
greedily.

=Gor´mid=, _a._ Selfish, individualistic.

The gorm, when you offer him a cigar, puts it in his pocket and says he “will smoke it after dinner.” When he loses his watch, he offers a reward which shrinks amazingly when his property is returned and he is sure of it back. (See _Igmoil_.)

The gorm never pays for his round of drinks. He manages so that the other fellow shall settle for the taxi and the tickets. He will never move up in the trolley-car or take his bundle from the seat. On the railway, he manages successfully to occupy four places at once.

The gorm is the woman who tries to get in ahead of the line which forms at the ticket office. She monopolizes the most attractive man in the room to the exclusion of her sisters. At the bargain counter the gorm holds three waists while she examines a fourth.

Children gorm candy and ice-cream; men gorm free lunches, and women in Pullman cars gorm the ladies’ room for hours and hours, behind locked doors. (See _Spigg_.)

And all girls gorm love, or try to gorm it.

_He gormed the fireplace, standing there
With coat tails to the flame
With easy grace, without a care
For us who, shivering, came._

_He gormed the magazines, and sat
On papers by the dozen;
But at our club we’re used to that--
Our gormid English cousin!_

=Gow´yop=, _n._ 1. A state of perplexity, wherein familiar persons or
things seem strange. 2. A person in an unfamiliar guise.

Have you ever been “turned around,” coming out of a theatre, after an exciting play? Right is left and west is east. You are in a gowyop. It is long before you can turn yourself about and make the world seem normal.

The husband who has just shaved off his beard is a gowyop to his wife. And his wife is a gowyop, after she has tinted her hair bright red. (See _Spigg_.)

The gowyop is like that room you see in the mirror,--so like, and yet so different. Your house, the day after the funeral, is a gowyop--everything seems so strange.

A pretty child, with his two front teeth out; a person you haven’t seen for many years and you now behold grown up; a son or a daughter who has just been married, are gowyops. So is the dignified old gentleman in the bathing suit. Or, that aristocratic dowager, who, when the house is on fire, appears in her night-gown; and your cook, when she is “dressed up.”

To the bachelor of science, returning after four years at college, home is a gowyop, too. (See _Thusk_.)

_All in a gowyop I descried
An unfamiliar world;
All upside down, I vainly tried
To get myself uncurled._

_But I was inside out, till when
I met my wife--the sight
Quite turned me outside in again--
She’d bleached her black hair white!_

=Gub´ble=, _n._ 1. A murmuring of many voices. 2. Society chatter.

=Gub´ble=, _v._ To indulge in meaningless conversation.

=Gub´ble-go=, _n._ 1. A crowded reception, a talking contest.

It’s like some huge, slimy reptile, with a hundred mouths, all murmuring. As you are admitted to the house, as the servant takes your hat and cane, the far-off sounds of gubbling strike you with terror; but it must be done. In you go. Everyone is talking, but no one is listening. Say anything you like--it will be lost in the gubble.

There’s gubble in a wordy play. There’s gubble at the steamer when you see a friend off for Europe--a flattering gubble, after you have performed in public. (See _Wumgush_.)

Letters of condolence usually consist of gubble. Editorials about marine or railway disasters are gubble. So are funeral sermons. (See _Alibosh_.)

_I entered, and I heard the hum
Of multitudinous gubble;
And I was terrified and dumb,
Anticipating trouble._

_When I remarked that hens had lice,
(Not knowing what I said),
My hostess smiled, and said “How nice!
Let me present Miss Stead!”_

=Huz´zle-coo=, _n._ 1. An intimate talk; a “heart-to-heart”
conversation; a private confidential chat. 2. A flirtation.

A huzzlecoo is an animated conversation between two women over the back fence. It is a business talk between two partners and their credit-man behind the locked doors of the office; it is the directors’ meeting which results in Jones being appointed.

Ward politicians hold huzzlecoos in the back rooms of saloons and make up their “slates.” Mother and daughter hold a huzzlecoo in Nellie’s pink cretonne bedroom over “that young man” who has become so attentive. After the baseball captain and his manager have a huzzlecoo, Five-Base Murphy is put into the box.

But if you’ve never heard two girls discussing a man, or sat in the front parlor with Moony Mamie, the Merry Maneater, till 2 A.M.--then I pity you; you’ll never know what a good hot huzzlecoo means. (See _Voriander_.)

_The huzzlecoo that Mary had
With me, the other night,
Was intimate and personal,
And,--well, you know all right!_

_The huzzlecoo her father had
With me, soon after that,
Was intimate and personal--
I left without my hat!_

=Hy´gog=, _n._ 1. An unsatisfied desire. 2. An anxious suspense.

=Hy-gog´i-cal=, _a._ Unattainable; next to impossible.

Oh, that hygogical curtain-shade that simply will _not_ catch, jiggle it up and down as you will! Oh, that mirror, too high for you, even on tiptoe! Oh, that telephone operator who won’t answer--and that match you can’t find, in the dark. Hygogs. Did you ever wait for a sneeze that wouldn’t come? It is a hygog.

The chandelier--just out of reach; with lighted match, how often have I striven to light the gas! It was a hygog. How near, and yet how far!

Your note paper too large for the envelope. Fold it over on the edges and cram it in-- No, it sticks, and will not go! It’s a hygog. Or, if once rammed in, no man can draw it forth. (See _Wijjicle_.)

Ah, but you suffer, not only for your hygog, but for another’s: The actor, who forgets his lines, the parlor elocutionist who pauses and cannot get the next verse--the hygog is an agony unendurable. (See _Splooch_.)

Hygogical is the strained anxiety of one who waits in nervous suspense for someone to meet her at the station in time to catch the train.

The cave-man knew it when, pursued by a saber-toothed tiger, he crawled out on the end of a too slender limb.

_In Baltimore an oyster rare
Lay on his shell of pearl,
Huge as an alligator pear--
’Twas placed before a girl._

_Two times to swallow it she tried,
Three times, and still did fail;
The hygog was too long, too wide--
Let’s kindly draw the veil!_

=Hyp´ri-jimp=, _n._ 1. A man in a woman’s place or who does women’s
work. 2. An obedient and thoroughly domesticated husband. 3. A man
entirely surrounded by women.

He may wash the dishes because his wife is ill, or because she is making a speech on the street corner; but he is still a hyprijimp. He may wheel the baby-carriage because he is in love with his offspring or afraid of his wife; he is a hyprijimp. (See _Vorge_.)

He who carries bundles, kisses his wife in public, does errands for his sister or criticises hats with real fervor is a hyprijimp.

The hyprijimp is the male guest at a woman’s club; a man at a prayer meeting, an author who reads his own poems, a non-smoker, a husband in an employment agency. (See _Varm_.)

The husband of a Suffragette is a hyprijimp. (See _Wowze_.)

_Within a tea-room, pink and dim,
Mid candlesticks and tiles,
A hyprijimp, the only Him,
Was waiting, wreathed in smiles._

_Ah, did he swear at Her delay?
Did rage his forehead crimp?
Oh, no, he was not built that way;
He was a hyprijimp!_

=Ig´moil=, _n._ 1. A quarrel over money matters; a sordid dispute. 2.
The driving of a hard bargain; a petty law suit.

Before the funeral was over, the brothers and sisters were fighting over the will; yes, before the father was dead, they had their igmoils over the property.

Woe to the wife of the stingy husband! Many are her igmoils. (See _Hyprijimp_.)

And yet no one can escape the igmoil when abroad. When they charge you, as an American, four times the price, how can you help trying to jew them down? (See _Jurp_.)

The igmoil is the pawnbroker’s daily bread.

To lose a friend through an igmoil, is the most sordid tragedy of life.

_My wife had bought a summer hat;
It cost her 19.20,
That is, of course, it cost_ me _that.
I thought 6.50 plenty._

_We had an igmoil, for, you see,
I had to have that money.
She couldn’t see I needed three
New golf clubs! Ain’t that funny?_

=Imp´kin=, _n_. A superhuman pet; a human offspring masquerading in
the form of a beast; an animal that is given overabundant care.

The impkin is the sole heir of Race Suicide, his mother being The High Cost of Living. He is supposed to “love his mummy.”

Impkins are canine and feline, but their parents are usually asinine.

The impkin is hyper-domesticated but doesn’t particularly like it. An impkin being frankly natural is always a shock to his mistress. (See _Frowk_.)

The impkin is particularly affected by large blondes, and always when their hair is hennaed.

Impkins have collars but no cuffs. They wear boots and ulsters and live in limousines. They give teas and grudgingly tolerate the presence of the master of the family. (See _Varm_.)

The impkin is supposed to have all of a baby’s virtues and none of his faults. It requires more care, but doesn’t jeopard one’s place in Society.

_An impkin, noble and refined,
Complained, “No doubt you see,
Of course, I do not have to mind
My mistress--she minds me.”_

_“A Pomeranian canine, I,--
She’s but a common woman;
She’s really quite insulting--why,
She seems to think I’m human!”_

=I´o-bink=, _n._ 1. An unplaceable resemblance; an uncertain
similarity. 2. An inaccessible memory. 3. An unexplainable sound.

A flash of mysterious semi-recognition confuses you for a moment. “Where--when--have I done just that thing before?” No use to search your memory or puzzle your wits; you can never catch up with the elusive thought: It’s an iobink.

That strangely familiar face you pass in the street--the figure you dimly recognize in the restaurant.

The iobink, like a will-o’-the-wisp, leads you on in fond pursuit. It was probably some clerk in a dry-goods store, or the assistant in the grocery. (See _Oofle_.)

So the iobink subtly tortures you. You hear its human voice in sounds of running water, or the moan of the wind. And, as you lie in bed, terrified, an unexplainable noise keeps you awake. But, it’s nothing--only an iobink.

What _is_ that word, that you cannot quite remember? It circles above your head, just out of reach. The iobink will not come, except uncalled. The tune you strive to bring back haunts you like a ghost. You cannot give it audible form. It hovers beyond your consciousness in a world of iobinks. (See _Rizgidget_.)

_Who was she? And what was her name?
Somehow, I couldn’t think.
Why was my memory so to blame?
It was an iobink._

_Where had I seen that face, that stare?
In some old, previous life?
The iobink dissolved--and there
She was--my former wife!_

=Jip=, _n._ 1. A dangerous topic of conversation; 2. A suggestive
remark.

=Jip´lish=, _a._ Likely to lead to an explosion; too personal.

Never make fun of Reno--even to Mrs. Newlywed--she may have a ticket already bought, and it will be a jip. (See _Pooje_.)

Never speak slightingly of actors, dentists, Jews, Socialists, mothers-in-law, plumbers, Christian Scientists or Progressives--the man in the embroidered velvet necktie who has begun to glare at you, may be all of them--it’s a jip.

Did you ever ask a grey-gowned brunette the whereabouts of her husband only to find that he had died last week? Rather jiplish!

Anyway, you’re pretty sure to make a jip with your girl, sooner or later--whether you discuss her best hat or her best friend, the talk is apt to be jiplish. To ask a woman her age is a jip.

Never ask a man what his wife said when he got home late--it’s a jip. (See _Skyscrimble_.)

_I asked Bill Green how Mrs. Green
Enjoyed her motor trip,
And if she liked their limousine--
Believe me, ’twas a jip!_

_It was a jip to talk of her,
For she eloped last fall;
She ran away with his chauffeur,
And took him, car and all!_

=Jir´ri-wig=, _n._ 1. A superficial traveler. 2. The Philistine
abroad. 3. A bromide in search of himself.

=Jir´ri-wig=, _v._ To travel with one’s eyes shut. To destroy
opportunity.

I met Mrs. Jirriwig first in Paris. She had been there three months, and had spent 87 days with modistes and lingeristes, one day at the Louvre--the rest of the time she had been ill. When she wasn’t trying on gowns, she was in a cab, going to or from the process. (See _Mooble_.)

Later, on the train, I met Mr. Jirriwig, on the way to Venice. The train flew by the bounteous beauties of Lombardy, historic and picturesque. Did Mr. Jirriwig look out of the window? No, he was too busy reading his Baedeker, learning about Venice. In Venice, he spent his time in gondolas, reading up Florence. In Florence he sat at little café tables, turning the pages of his red-covered book and getting acquainted with Rome. So he saw Europe,--in type.

But there are thousands of Jirriwigs in Paris. They have been there for years, and all the French they know is “_Combien?_” They are in a state of perpetual disgust, that things are so different to anything in the United States.

But there are Jirriwigs in New York also. They live in the Subway, in offices and in flats. (See _Cowcat_.)

_Said Mr. Jirriwig, one day,
To Mrs. Jirriwig,
“Let’s see the Versailles fountains play;
They say they’re fine and big!”_

_“Yes,” said his wife, “they’re fine and big,
I’ve seen them once, you know!”
“Thank God!” said Mr. Jirriwig,
“Then I won’t have to go!”_

=Ju´jasm=, _n._ 1. A much-needed relief; a long-desired satisfaction.
2. An expansion of sudden joy.

=Ju-jas´mic=, _a._ Offering relief from suffering, or an escape from
ennui.

Thank God the train has started! So, after the long, dreary wait on a side-track, your heart expands in a delicious jujasm. As noise after long silence, so is silence after much noise, a jujasm. (See _Gollohix_.)

After your slow recovery, jujasmic is the doctor’s dictum, “I think we’ll have to get you up tomorrow.”

Why is Helen’s face with wild jujasm alight? Dilatory Dick has at last proposed. (See _Xenogore_.)

As deep as the grim horror of the dentist’s deed, just so high does your spirit rise in jujasm when the tooth is out.

Spring! After the long suspense is over, the first day of balm and warmth brings jujasm to your heart.

As a hot drink on a sleigh-ride; as food after a long fast--so is the first sight of women to a sailor, after his eighteen months at sea, jujasmic.

Last night, I took high-browed Harriet to the theatre, and she talked of her soul, while I perished. Oh, the rise of the curtain on that third act of farcical folly! It was a jujasm. (See _Orobaldity_.)

_Jujasmic is it when, at night,
Your baby stops his wails;
Or when the land, at last in sight,
The seasick traveller hails._

_But what are such jujasms to this--
(I hope your memory’s strong,)
That first ecstatic, rapturous kiss
You waited for, so long!_

=Jul´lix=, _n._ 1. A mental affinity, with a similar taste and
inclination. 2. One who knew you when you were a child.

“He speaks my own language!” Smile if you will, and call it sentimentality, but some there are, your jullixes, who laugh at the same jokes as you and weep at the same sights. Out of the ruck of social five-o’clocks you pick them, like single pearls out of dead oysters, and they shine in your memory forever. Three words spoken, and you know them as you know yourself; and you have floated lightly from ports of conventionality, never to return. (See _Frime_.)

Such is your jullix. It is not only that he loves your authors and your songs; not that he has been to the same queer foreign little towns that you have “discovered”--or even that she has had the same operation. Of your jullix you know far more than that--you know his soul.

When you are rich, sedate and prominent, comes one with whiskers and calls you, “Bill!” He knew you when you wore short trousers; and he, too, knows your language--that all but forgotten speech of your youth. (See _Thusk_.)

Is she a jullix who was once engaged to the man whom you have married? A jullix? Yes, but alas, she knows too much for friendship!

A woman’s jullix is one who knows her real age.

_How Elsie stared! Did Elsie guess
What bond united her
To that girl opposite her? Yes!
It was her jullix, sure._

_Oh, not from souls akin, and less
From friendship did she know her;
But both had bought the self-same dress
In the same department store!_

=Jurp=, _n._ 1. A haughty inferior; a saucy underling. 2. An impudent
servant or clerk.

=Jur´pid=, _a._ Insubordinate or impertinent.

Cooks, brakemen, shop girls are often jurpid. The whistling, gum-chewing office boy, who won’t take in your card and says, “The manager’s out,” is jurpid.

The officious policeman, the barber who talks, the headwaiter, who always gives you the table you don’t want, is jurpid when you object. (See _Moosoo_.)

What good does it do to report the jurp? You’ll only have on your conscience the fact that a man with a big family has lost his job. And so, you swallow his jurpid jibes.

“Well,” says the jurpid milliner, “you _said_ you wanted a red hat, and this hat’s red. We ain’t got anything _redder_. If I’d a-known you wanted _blue_, why didn’t you say so, and I’d a-shown you some purple ones! You can see for yourself green’s more becoming, though.”

Colored maids, messenger boys and janitors cannot help being jurps--they were born that way. (See _Splooch_.)

_It was a jurp who answered back,
Impertinent and pert;
A filthy beast, who drove a hack--
You should have seen his shirt!_

_And I a gentleman! Whee-ew,
What jurpid things he said!
I’d given him a dollar, too!
But it was made of lead._

=Kid´loid=, _n._ 1. A precocious or self-assertive infant; an _enfant
terrible_. 2. A hotel or stage child. Any juvenile person who is
too ubiquitous.

=Kid´loid=, _a._ Impertinent or offensive, in a childish way.

In the hotel the kidloid is manufactured and developed from shy and timid modesty to the final perfect stages of conspicuous vulgarity. He is like an improbable old man, or a cynical hag but without the charm of age.

The kidloid, in comic papers, hides under the couch when his sister’s beau is calling, and is subsequently bribed to silence. In actual life, however, he is much more offensive when you know he’s about. (See _Vorge_.)

The kidloid is called upon to recite “pieces” before company, and invariably makes a fool of his parents.

The kidloid makes conversation an agony, and has the apparent power of a multiple personality. He seems like at least a dozen persons when he is in the room.

Kidloids are created by fond and idolatrous parents by the simple process of giving them their own way.

The stage kidloid is a cross between an intelligent ape and a mummy. The hotel kidloid is an anthropoid dynamo. (See _Gollohix_.)

_The Kidloid at the Beach Hotel
We thought a model child,
For he behaved so very well--
He was so meek and mild._

_But every girl, for comfort’s sake,
Had paid him, every day
That she had company, to make
That kidloid stay away!_

=Kipe=, _v._ To inspect critically; to appraise pragmatically; to eye
with jealousy or envy.

=Kipe=, _n._ A woman’s glance at another woman.

Up and down, from hat to heel, women kipe each other insolently as they pass. In subway or in street-car, every woman who enters is kiped by her shrewd-eyed sisters. In that keen first glance, every article of the new comer’s raiment is appraised. (See _Flooijab_.)

So, at the employment agency, the housewife kipes the cook, and cook kipes housewife, each turning away with the thought, “She won’t do for me.” (See _Snosh_.)

Employer kipes the applicant for position, accepts or rejects. The poker-player, with his last blue chip in the pot, kipes his four-card draw. The fastidious smoker kipes the gift cigar. The golfer kipes his “lie.”

Says Aunt Samanthy Hanks to Mary Jane at the county fair, as she kipes the patchwork bedquilts in the gallery, “Mine’s better’n her’n.” Says the mother of the bride, as she kipes the wedding presents spread out on the table, “H’m! his folks must be close-fisted.” (See _Gefoojet_.)

As you whiz, motoring through the park, a car flashes by--but not too fast for your automobile host to kipe it: “1913 36-6 ‘Strangler’-- No good!”

So do the village girls kipe the strange young man in town.

_Carlotta kipes at Ermyntrude,
And Ermyntrude at Rose;
And every stitch that each has on
Each other lady knows._

_Each lady knows the other’s faults,
Her quality and size,
And just how old and good she is;
Would men were half as wise!_

=Krip´sle=, _n._ A worrying physical sensation, an invisible
annoyance absorbing one’s attention.

=Krip´sly=, _a._ Distracting, distrait, unmentionably provocative.

Walking on spilt sugar is kripsly.

That fugitive morsel of walnut-meat in the cavity of your bi-cuspid, which your tongue chases so thoughtfully, but in vain--a fascinating kripsle, as kripsly as a loose tooth! (See _Vorge_.)

Has a hairpin fallen down your back? Smile, and don’t be kripsly; beware that faraway look that tells the story! And when through that hole in your stocking your big toe sticks out, don’t be kripsled!

The ancient Stoics, like the modern Christian Scientists, declared that all kripsles were Error. But Mortal Mind knows full well that when you have both hands and arms full of bundles, the drop that hangs, pulling at the end of your nose, is a kripsle hard to bear--it cannot be snuffed in or shaken off.

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_.)

_For months and months the Hemmingways
Have lallified of Baby,
How Baby walks and talks and plays--
And have I listened? Maybe._

_But now the time has come, today,
To lallify that pair;
For I am working on a play,
And talk about it there!_

=Le´o-lump=, _n._ 1. An interrupter of conversations; one who always
brings the talk back to himself. 2. An egoist; one who thinks you
are necessarily interested in what interests him.

“When I was in Italy,” I began, carelessly--

“Oh, dear, I’ve never been out of New York!” she whined. “I do wish I could go to Italy sometime!”

She was a leolump. I could not mention anything without her applying it to herself. The word “objective” was not in her dictionary.

The leolump always caps your story with one stranger and bigger than yours. He has acquired the art of the superlative. (See _Persotude_.)

Talk to a leolump actor of logarithms, and in an instant he will prove relationship; he can show himself to be first cousin to the carbo-hydrates in a congress of foreign chemists.

Conversation? Impossible when a leolump is present. Even if he has the civility not to interrupt, which he hasn’t, the minute you stop speaking he is astride his hobby and riding himself to social suicide. (See _Blurb_.)

He has a million subjects ready in the pigeon-hole marked “I.”

Women are seldom leolumps, for they never allow the conversation to depart from the subject of themselves. And so they never have to interrupt, or bring the topic back.

_He breaks into your talk, and cries,
“Oh, that reminds me,”--then
Oh, how his tale your patience tries!
But you begin again._

_A leolump you cannot shame;
His head is like a fly’s;
His brain is small, but all the same,
He has a thousand “I’s.”_

=Loob´lum=, _n._ 1. A pleasant thing that is bad for one; rich, but
dangerous food. 2. A flatterer; flattery.

=Loob´loid=, _a._ 1. Sweet, but indigestible.

Loobloid is the broiled live lobster and the hot mince pie. Loobloid, ice water when you are warm and whiskey when you are cold.

But human nature still woos the looblum. For youthful inexperience, green apples and the first cigar; for age, ennui and discouragement,--opium, morphine and cocaine.

Yes, all those things of which the bromide says, “I like them, but they don’t like me,” are loobloid. Black coffee at night and a cocktail in the morning--both are looblums.

And yet, the mental looblums are worse; corroding the character with sweetest poisons. How rapturously we gulp them down! You ask criticism on what you know is bad, and enjoy the loobloid praise. On his opening night, the ambitious playwright makes his speech in answer to the looblums of applause. (See _Wumgush_.)

On the morning after her wedding-day, the blue-nosed bride reads loobloid descriptions of her beauty at the ceremony.

Most loobloid, but most sweet! The flattery of the fond and doting parent. (See _Culp_.)

_My after-dinner speech was lame,
No gift of gab is mine;
The chairman praised me, all the same,
He said my talk was fine._

_I had been terrified, and I
Made blunders that were frightful;
The chairman lied--but what’s a lie?
His looblum was delightful!_

=Ma-chiz´zlum=, _n._ 1. A thinly disguised boredom. 2. A
disappointing spectacle. 3. The apotheosis of the obvious.

=Ma-chiz´zle=, _v._ 1. To attempt unsuccessfully to please. 2. To try
too hard to like something.

Pageants, processions and picnics are all machizzlums; for well you know before they start, that boredom shall be yours. Why does one stand jammed, crowded, uncomfortable, peering over bobbing heads at men in curious costumes marching by? Why endure the long waits of the machizzlum? After it is over, one wonders why he has just consented to be machizzled.

Almost every motion picture show is a machizzlum to sane-brained folk. So is watching the election returns, or an automobile race where there are no accidents, or a partial eclipse of the moon.

Do you call upon a belle? Do you try to converse with the “popular” man? Surely you will be machizzled. Don’t try to read the book that has been too widely praised; what everyone likes, is sure to be a machizzlum. (See _Ovotch_.)

The easiest way to be machizzled, is to fall in love with an actress.

The young, young girl smirks and smiles and blushing, says: “O Mr. Poet, tell me, when did you first find you had this power?” But to the less sentimental herd, the great machizzlum is to be introduced to a celebrity. (See _Yowf_.)

_It costs you ten to see the sight,
The weather always lowers;
Your seat is narrow, hard and tight,
You wait for hours and hours;_

_And when at last the thing is o’er,
And the last red light has fizzled
You know the thing has been a bore;
Once more you’ve been machizzled!_

=Meem=, _n._ An artificial half light that women love; a charitable
obscurity; a becoming gloom.

=Meem´y=, _a._ Obscure, dim, uncertain.

From a brilliantly lighted hall outside, you plunge into the meemy parlors wherein shadows flit, vague, uncertain. You stumble over a rug. A silhouette rises and comes forth to meet you. How many are there there? Who are they? Mysterious is the meem!

Meemy is that uneasy, tantalizing obscurity, that depressed semi-darkness that women who-would-be-artistic find so necessary for the preservation of their charms. To a man the meem is maddening and meaningless; if there are pretty women present, he wishes to see them. (See _Kipe_.)

There’s a dim, religious meem, the shadowy penumbra of great cathedrals--the sentimental meem, the sad gloom of the funeral--the amorous meem, the starlit darkness, wherein lovers linger.

The meemy woman always sits with her back to the light, to watch you from an ambush. (See _Squinch_.)

Candles are meemy, especially red ones--except when used properly, in clusters.

Still, a meem does keep out the flies.

_All meemy was the studio,
And meemy maidens--wait!
Say, were they maidens? Heavens, no!
Are maidens thirty-eight?_

_Well, anyway, they passed for such,
For candles make a meem
That women think disguises much.
Things are not what they seem._

=Moo´ble=, _n._ 1. A mildly amusing affair; a moderate success. 2. A
person or thing over whom it is difficult to be enthusiastic.

=Moo´bly=, _adj._, _adv._ Innocuous, feebly, without unction.

The Samoans have a word which means, “A-party-is-approaching-which-contains-neither -a-clever-man-nor-a-pretty-woman.” It’s a mooble. Dancing with your own wife is a mooble--a fairly good play, a dinner-party where the _ménu_ makes up for the _dramatis personæ_--moobles!

Mooble is the word that “Damns with faint praise”--an “awfully nice girl”--why not say it point blank: “She’s a mooble.” (See _Cowcat_.)

Thanksgiving dinner in a restaurant--a mooble.

A tame young man--a mooble. (See _Snosh_.)

You may be a wonder with women,--leaving a trail of fire behind you as you go--but you’re a mooble at tennis. You’re a mooble at pool, too, although you “used to play a very good game.”

Moobly novels are written by--well, of course you know already. Moobly foods: cornstarch custard, warm iced tea, vanilla ice cream. The W.C.T.U. is a mooble. So is a commencement essay, and most tall, blonde women.

But the perfect mooble is the man you used to be engaged to. (See _Thusk_.)

_At first I thought her a genius bright,
Almost an angel--out of sight!
But the second time that I went to call
I found her a mooble, after all._

_Only a mooble, and then she wrote,
Oh, what a moobly, moobly note!
And how can you wonder my love should end?
She began her letter to me, “Dear Friend”!_

=Moo´soo=, _a._ 1. Sulky, out of sorts, blue, taciturn, discontented.
2. Unsuccessful; getting out of order; going wrong, delayed.

Moosoo is a mild form of “the dumps.” You are moosoo while waiting for someone who is late, especially late for dinner; when your dress doesn’t quite fit, or isn’t quite becoming.

Moosoo is the secondary stage of getting over acute ill humor. It is the mood of the wife in her second year of marriage.

Moosoo is the clerk who is discontented with his position. Moosoo is the salesman, when you return goods or exchange them. (See _Jurp_.)

Moosoo is the brakeman, when the train is delayed.

The wall-flower at the dance is moosoo, though her smiles are pungent.

Moosoo is the maiden when the young man fails to propose, although she shows it not.

Moosoo is the interested escort, when the restaurant music is too loud at dinner. (See _Huzzlecoo_.)

Children are moosoo, when they can’t go to the circus; the traveling salesman, when his cigar leaks; and even the polite husband, when the burned chops are set before him.

The weather, itself, can be moosoo, with clouds and dullness for weeks at a time.

_The day was moosoo; Mary Ann
Was moosoo, so was I;
And moosoo were the girl and man
Whom we’d invited--why?_

_Why did we sulk, disgusted, far
From home, discouraged, blue?
Because my brand new motor-car
Alas, was moosoo, too!_

=Nink=, _n._ 1. A useless “antique” object, preserved in worship of
the picturesque. 2. An imitation of a by-gone style.

=Nink´ty=, _a._ Architecturally dishonest.

You buy your ninks at “Ye Olde Shoppe” and by that “Ye”--you shall know the ninkty. For a nink is a brass candlestick with no candle in it; the pewter mugs and platters, unpolished, on the sideboard; the old china, dusty and unused upon the wall; old tiles and brass knockers.

The old flax-wheel in the corner is a nink; the framed old sporting prints of horse races and stagecoaches; the framed theatre bills. Pompeian bronze tripods, never lighted, in hotel corridors. (See _Gorgule_.)

A beefsteak party is a nink, and May-day dances and pageants; anything revived, revamped for modern use. Doors, covered with nails and decorative hinges bolted on; things sewed with thongs; imitation parchment scrolls. Whale-oil lamps, ships’ lanterns; almost any object of leather, copper, or brass. (See _Gefoojet_.)

Architectural ninks are imitation beams in the ceiling; hollow columns; furniture, with imitation mortises and pegs.

The ninkiest nink of all is the framed motto on the wall, or a legend painted over the fireplace.

_The ninks that Mr. Parvenu
Has bought, because “artistic,”
Are “genuine antiques,” though you
Call them anachronistic._

_But still, one nink is not disgraced--
That sun dial he got
Is now appropriately placed;
He put it on his yacht!_

=Nodge=, _n._ 1. The only one of its kind or set. 2. A person who
doesn’t “fit in;” a Martian.

=Nod´gy=, _a._ 1. Impertinent, inconsistent, inapplicable; having no
mate.

Wife or housewife--all women know the nodge. It’s the odd tumbler, or odd plate,--the one button whose mates have disappeared; the one glove that persistently turns up; the single shoe or stocking; those three trading-stamps she doesn’t throw away.

Nodgy is that extra envelope--too small for the paper; the one chair that doesn’t match the furniture; the lone coat, whose skirt has long since worn out; the hat that goes with no possible gown.

Nodgy is the Methodist minister at a poker party; nodgy the cut-up at prayer meeting, or the ugly damsel at the ball.

The modest country girl is nodgy with women who smoke cigarettes. (See _Ovotch_.)

How long have you saved that old lace yoke--waiting for something to put it on. Throw it away! It’s a nodge. (See _Gefoojet_.)

_I took my aunt to see the town,
A task I couldn’t dodge;
At every cabaret she’d frown,
She was a perfect nodge._

_But when, to visit her, I went
To Pudding Centre, Mass.,
She took me to a gospel tent,
I was a nodge, alas!_

=Nul´kin=, _n._ 1. The core or inside history of any occurrence. A
true, but secret explanation. 2. Facts known, but not told.

The “nigger-in-the-woodpile” was named Mr. Nulkin.

The object of a trial by jury is to find the nulkin of the crime.

Why were they divorced? What does she see in him? Nobody knows the nulkin. It is the skeleton in the closet.

The nulkin is the true motive. _Cherchez la nulkin._

The diplomatic service is full of nulkins.

Why didn’t we go to war with Mexico? Did we fear Japan? What is the nulkin?

Why did she get the part of leading lady? This is the theatrical nulkin.

Why is a book popular? Publishers strive in vain to discover the literary nulkin. (See _Edicle_.)

Why do imitators fail? Because they copy outside traits, and not the inmost nulkin. (See _Bripkin_.)

A nulkin is the secret thought you never tell,--the real reason why your wife doesn’t like Sarah.

_“What does he see in her?” we ask;
“What does she see in him?”
Ah, matrimonial nulkins task
The brains of seraphim!_

_The nulkin is what you have tried,
And I have tried to know;
Instead, we judge from what’s outside--
Perhaps ’tis better so._

=Oo´fle=, _n._ 1. A person whose name you cannot remember. 2. A state
of forgetfulness regarding a friend or thing.

=Oo´fle=, _v._ 1. To try to find out a person’s name without asking.
2. To talk to an unknown person without introducing him to a nearby
friend.

=Oofled=, _p.p._ Mortified needlessly.

“How do you do, Mr. Goheevus; you don’t remember me, do you?” Are you oofled? If you are not, you will say, “No, why should I?” But alas, one usually _is_ oofled, and struggles desperately to conceal the fact, groping wildly in the well of one’s memory for the lost name, while one’s friends stand about reproachfully, waiting to be introduced.

Any person whose name is Baker is an oofle,--or Brown, or Davis. The other most celebrated oofles are Harris, Johnson, Miller, Palmer, Pratt, Porter, Stevens, Simpson, Richards, Roberts, Taylor, Wheeler and Wilson. Can you ever tell one from another? No, not even if the pistol is held to your head! (See _Iobink_.)

Of course what’s an oofle to you may not be oofly to me, especially if my name is Goheevus. (See _Mooble_.) But everyone is oofled by a hostess who mumbles her introductions. (See _Cowcat_.)

_No wonder I was oofled, for,
Although I knew his face,
In some way, for the life of me,
His name I couldn’t place;_

_Now, was it Harris, Johnson, Brown,
Or Palmer, Jones or Platt?
He was an Oofle, anyway--
There was no doubt of that!_

=O-ro-bal´di-ty=, _n._ 1. Modern witchcraft; Orientalism adapted to
Occidental intellects; Emerson-and-milk. 2. An alleged process of
getting wise quickly; a short cut to success.

Orobaldity in its most acute form, _i. e._, Vedantic philosophy with the asceticism left out, is particularly affected by females who are not willing to gain success or happiness through mere effort. It consists of gambling with the intellect, in order to gain a dishonest percentage of mental profit.

Orobaldity is, in the main, a modern magic supposed to be controlled by cryptic phrases and abracadabra such as “into the silence” and “holding the thought.” It is not necessary to know the esoteric meaning of such charms, or to exert any actual energy in obtaining one’s desires. (See _Gubble_.)

Orobaldity is a thing of “vibrations” and “thought currents” and is founded mainly upon analogies with wireless telegraphy and other modern scientific discoveries. It finds occult meanings in colors and numbers.

Orobaldity is medieval mysticism, mainly practised by women who have nothing else to do. (See _Mooble_.)

Actresses out of work find in orobaldity a good substitute for trying to get an engagement. Neurotic and erotic temperaments find it an admirable stimulant to egoism.

_First she was a Christian Scientist,
And then a New Thought daughter;
Next she became a Theosophist,
Then Bahaiism caught her._

_But now her Occultism wanes,
Astrology dispelling;
Her Orobaldity remains
As just plain Fortune-Telling._

=O´votch=, _n._ 1. One who does things merely because others do. One
swayed by popular crazes, the victim of custom. 2. A currently
popular fad or form of amusement.

To-day, baseball is an ovotch; dancing, whist, golf, Eurythmics, Eugenics, Kelly pool and Burgess Unabridged. (See _Blurb_.)

Golf is a re-ovotch, a revival of an obsolete sport. The popular tune of the day is an ovotch; the current slang; the fad of the hour in custom and costume.

Past is the ovotch of the bicycle, croquet and archery; to-morrow the ovotch may be put upon flying, skin-tight trousers, or free love. (See _Thusk_.)

One ovotch will never be revived, the family reciter, with her vox humana tremulo voice.

_In Grandma’s time, the ovotch quaint
Was to be meek and modest;
She used to have the “vapors”--(faint)
She was so tightly bodiced._

_What is the ovotch for a maid
To-day? The gown that lets
Her lissome figure be displayed,--
And smoking cigarettes._

=Pa-loo´dle=, _n._ 1. One who gives unnecessary or undesired
information. 2. Uncalled-for advice. 3. A recital of obvious
details.

=Pa-loo´dle=, _v._ To give the above; to assume omniscience.

=Pa-loo´dlum.= A paloodle talk.

Have you ever in the theatre sat in front of a gabby gent, who paloodles his girl with the story of the play, announcing each entrance and exit?

The paloodle is ubiquitous; at the baseball game, he explains each play; at the pool-table, he tells you what you ought to do, or should have done. He is proficient in the knowledge of how to run other people’s business. (See _Drillig_.)

Old maids paloodle you with advice on how to train your children, or how to manage a husband. (See _Lallify_.)

A horse falls on the slippery pavement. Immediately it is surrounded with paloodles, suggesting blankets, and straps and buckles, and “Sit on its head.” It’s the paloodle’s head that should be sat upon.

The stage manager paloodles the actor: “You cross here,” he says; and, “You want to cry all through that scene.” No wonder the dramatic critic also paloodles the actor on the opening night. (See _Yowf_ and _Edicle_.)

Paloodling the baby is the favorite occupation of the second year of married life. “How to cure a cold,” a paloodlum in six parts.

_Each base was full, the score was tied,
The strikes they numbered two;
Still that paloodle at my side
Paloodled me and you!_

_The inning was the ninth, alas,
But the end I did not see--
For I was murdering the ass
Who’d been paloodling me!_

=Paw´dle=, _n._ 1. One who is vicariously famous, rich or
influential. 2. A person of mediocre ability, raised to undeserved
prominence.

=Paw´dle=, _v._ To wear another’s clothes.

You all know him, the pawdle, or her, who pawdles in unpaid-for prosperity.

The husband of the famous wife, or the wife of a Star.

The child of a celebrity; the daughter of a president. (See _Yowf_.)

The editor of an Anthology, or a translator. An adopted child. A woman with dyed hair. An officer of the militia. An American countess. The author of a privately printed book. (See _Edicle_.)

To pawdle is to go to the theatre on passes; to ride in other people’s automobiles, to use hotel or club stationery.

To pawdle is the poor husband of the rich wife; also the husband of the industrious vaudeville artiste, or the farmer, who lets Florrie do all the work, while he talks politics at the village store. (See _Hyprijimp_.)

Behold Brother Pawdle, the Past Grand Worthy Superior Thingamajig, of the Glorified Order of Pawdles, in his transcendental uniform and gold sword! He is really the book-keeper of a fish-shop.

_Only a pawdle--don’t tell her so,
For she thinks, as pawdles do,
She is sought because of herself, you know;
But you know that that isn’t true._

_Only a pawdle--but never mind,
For she’ll die in due season, when
Her proper place she will really find--
Not even a pawdle, then!_

=Per´so-tude=, _n._ Social warmth, personal magnetism, charm.

=Per´so-mag=, _n._ The unit of social favor.

A man charged to the highest voltage of persotude could borrow any amount of money. The charge fluctuates in the same person. After a good dinner, one vibrates sometimes up to 7,000 persomags. Cocktails, compliments and social success make one buzz with persotude. (See _Gubble_.)

Anyone troubled with negative persotude should take a rest cure and test his recovery by trying to sell life insurance, which requires the greatest sparking charge. (See _Spuzz_.)

Persotude is independent of beauty, though it is hard to make a woman believe it. Getting rich adds to one’s persotude,--but not always. Rockefeller’s persotude is less than 6-1/2 persomags. (See _Yowf_.)

Nicknames are prime evidence of rich persotude.

The highest persomags in America are Roosevelt, Christie Matthewson and Maude Adams.

_When Walter, at his Sunday School
Declaimed “The Old Front Gate,”
They flattered so the little fool
His persotude was great._

_He went upon the stage and planned
To be a tragic hero,
He never even got a “hand”--
His persotude was zero._

=Pooje=, _n._ 1. An embarrassing situation; a sense of guilt; a
regrettable discovery. 2. One who is caught in the act.

=Pooje=, _v._ To make a painful discovery; unwittingly to create a
scene.

=Poojed=, _p.p._ Disconcerted, mortified, aghast.

A pooje is a sudden desire to become invisible; as when, entertaining company, the neat housewife sees a cockroach crawl along the floor.

John was kissing Mary, when Eliza opened the door. It was a pooje. John and Mary were poojed good. But even this wasn’t as bad as when John tried to kiss Eliza. She poojed him. “Sir!” she said, “how _dare_ you?”

Last night I dreamed that I was standing on the corner of Forty-second Street and Broadway at 10-45 P.M. just as the theatre crowd swept by. Yes, of course you know the sensation well--I was in my night-gown, with bare feet! Was I poojed? Rath-_er_! (See _Agowilt_.)

Also, you can get poojed merely by trying to step up a top stair which doesn’t happen to be there, or by being caught putting one cent in the contribution-plate.

Never listen at the keyhole when a man and his wife are quarreling inside; he may suddenly open the door and pooje you. (See _Bimp_.)

_Said Parks to his stenographer,
“All ready? Well, take this!”
And then Parks gave the girl a hug,
And then gave her a kiss._

_Just then the door was opened wide,
And his surprise was huge--
’Twas Parks’s wife; he nearly died,
For Parks was in a pooje!_

=Quink=, _n._ 1. An expression or mood of anxious expectancy;
absorbed determination.

=Quinked=, _p.p._ Haggardly resolute, with the excitement of
suspense.

=Quink´y=, _a._ Tense, uncertain, fearful.

A quink is the Welch rarebit face, the expression of one serving at tennis, or playing a difficult pool shot,--lifting the ball out of a bad golf hazard.

Women are quinked when they open a telegram; a boy, as he lights a fire-cracker. A girl, when in front of the glass, as she turns around to see if her underskirt is hanging down behind. A man, when he reads the ticker tape, during a panic, or is buttoning up the back of his wife’s dress.

A waiter is quinked when his customer takes the change from the plate--how much will be the tip? The cook, when she is trying the candy in a cup of cold water. The mother, as she waits for the fever to turn. (See _Squinch_.)

A quink is that expression you have on your face just before the tooth is pulled; the minute before the flashlight goes off; when she pulls the trigger of the gun.

You are quinked when you wait for someone who is late, or when you hurry to catch the last train, with only four seconds to spare.

The fat man’s face is quinked, when he tries to tie his own shoes. It is the face of the man, swimming under water, or of the playwright, on his opening night. (See _Snosh_.)

_On Henry’s face the lines were set,
Distraught, he frowned and blinked;
Why? He was all alone, and yet
He was severely quinked._

_He heard the bell, but to the door
He dared not go, to-day;
For he was quinked until that bore
At last had walked away._

=Quis´ty=, _a._ Useful and reliable but not ornamental.

=Quis´ter=, _n._ A person or thing that is beloved for its
efficiency, character or worth, rather than for decorative value.

She was not beautiful, but she was business-like; she knew how to spell “its” and “it’s” and “there” and “their” and “they’re.” Her employer did not propose to her or take her out to dinner, but he would not have parted with her for a fortune. She was quisty. (See _Splooch_.)

The little tin motor-car your sporting friends call a “road-louse” will go as far as his gas-drinking, tire-burning, oil-consuming “Complex” and for one-tenth the money. It isn’t pretty, and it isn’t expensive, but it’s quisty.

Your jimmy-pipe is quisty, and so is that old mangy dressing-gown and that comfortable, worn pair of corsets, and those shabby shoes you hate to throw away. (See _Gefoojet_.)

Awful were the ugly apartments of the 80’s, but the rooms were large and airy; no such quisty flats nowadays.

Do you use an old-fashioned barber-style razor? Why? Because it’s quisty. That’s why you use that prehistoric stylographic pen, instead of a fountain, with a stiff, scratchy nib. (See _Wijjicle_.)

Is your faithful, sympathetic wife a quister? Remember, it’s always the best-looking women who go through the divorce courts.

_A pretty maid had Mrs. Slade,
And Mr. Slade admired her;
He used to glance at her askance
So much the Mrs. fired her._

_A quisty maid now cooks for Slade,
She’s uglier and thinner,
But Mrs. Slade is much dismayed;
Slade won’t come home to dinner._

=Quoob=, _n._ 1. A misfit, an incompetent person. 2. A person or
thing obviously out of place. 3. One not worldly wise.

=Quoob=, _v._ To act differently than the rest; to commit a solecism;
to be in the wrong place.

As you stand on the doorstep arrayed in your best, a sudden pang smites you. The door is opened. There is a look of blank astonishment, as you are ushered in. No hostess comes to greet you, no gay appareled guests are there. You are a quoob. The dinner is _next_ Thursday, not to-night. (See _Zobzib_.)