2:54 pm

I called upon the bard Kinch at his summer residence and found him deep in the study of the Summa contra Gentiles in the company of two gonorrheal ladies, Fresh Nelly and Rosalie, the coalquay whore.  The house itself boasts an excellent prospect well situated adjacent to several acres of bountiful woods and rolling hillsides.  Wandering the gardens with Fresh Nelly and Rosalie in a blueribboned hat one cannot help but fancy himself a pleased Bottom stroked by beautiful Titania, or even a mischievous Puck a laugh tripping over his lips as he frolics with the delightful nymphs and fairies of the forest.  To my great delight our party grew in number very shortly after my arrival to include the distinguished man of letters Cashel Boyle O’Connor Fitzmaurice Tisdall Farrell, who spent much of his time in Kinch’s well-appointed library.  However, the most diverting of the company proved to be a company of players including Toby Tostoff (a ruined Pole), Crab (a bushranger), Mother Grogan, and two young medical students Dick and Davy sporting newbarbered, wellkempt heads.  That evening we danced within the ballroom’s pillared Moorish hall, shadows entwined, to the dulcet tones of the ladies’ song who entertained into the night with sweetly varying voices, mopping and chanting with waving graceful arms.  The evenings entertainments so inspired Cashel Boyle O’Connor Fitzmaurice Tisdall Farrell that he favored us with a parable which I quote inexactly from memory:

Fresh Nelly was eating grapes in the park when, Medical Dick, an extremely well-endowed young man, introduced himself to her.  He invited her to go for a ride in a taxi-cab on the floor of which they did something Fresh Nelly had never done before.  After they had done it several times in different ways, Medical Dick suggested that Fresh Nelly tidy up at the home of his aunt, Lady Rosalie, who welcomed them with great cordiality.  Lady Rosalie led Fresh Nelly to her boudoir where she requested the girl to perform a rather surprising service.  Downstairs the three of them played a most amusing game of Medical Dick’s own invention called “Thumbfumble.”  They then sat down to a sumptuous tea.  After he had finished the washing-up, Toby Tostoff, the butler, an unusually well-informed man of middle age, joined them for another frolic.  Medical Dick and Lady Rosalie had little difficulty in persuading Fresh Nelly to spend a few days with them.  In the interval before dinner she perused an album of instructive chromolithographs entitled, ‘Die Sieben und Dreibig Wollufte’ which Lady Rosalie had thoughtfully set out.  Colonel Crab and his wife Mother Grogan came in after dinner; both of them had wooden legs, with which they could do all sorts of entertaining tricks.  The evening was a huge success, in spite of someone fainting from time to time.  Fresh Nelly, quite exhausted, was helped to bed by Lady Rosalie’s French maid, Titania, whom she found delightfully sympathetic.  The next morning she was wakened in a novel fashion by Lady Rosalie in time for elevenses.  Looking out the window she saw Medical Dick, Toby Tostoff, and Bottom, the gardener, an exceptionally well-made youth, disporting themselves on the lawn.  They were soon joined by Medical Davy, Medical Dick’s singularly well-favoured sheepdog, and many were the giggles and barks that came from the shrubbery.  They called up to Fresh Nelly, who, having put on an ingeniously constructed bathing slip, met them in the pool.

Indeed as I relate this first part of Cashel Boyle O’Connor Fitzmaurice Tisdall Farrell’s most inspirational tale I find myself growing extremely flushed and ardently fear I must stop lest I shall be overcome and my memory fail me in ways ruinous to the spirit of the tale.  I believe the story ended with this charming couplet which reminds us rather delightfully of the apt advice professed by the great oracle of Delphi to know thyself: