^|aEven should not the framing ^|bup^b| of such fictions ^|bin the evidential order^b| bring any truth to light ^|bin good time^b| as fortuitously as some false setting of a starchart might ^|b(heaven aiding)^b| reveal the presence of an unknown being in ^|bspace chaos of space^b|a| The ^|abest soundest^a| opinion now holds that by so playing possum our highest common ancestor most effectually saved his brush. Dogs of all breeds were speaking with ^|avarious marked^a| provincial accents, hot to run him ^|aon a scent breasthigh^a|, but from the good ^|aday^a| he last was viewed pointing for home ^|ain his 7mile ^|brolltop^b| boots^a| a deaf fox's wisdom kept him safe in covert ^|amiraculously ravenfed & sustained by the clotted creamclotted sherriness of cinnamon syllabub^a|. Preserving perseverance ^|ain the reeducation of his intestines^a| was ^|athe best ^|bhis best the^b|a| rebuttal whereby he got the big bulge on ^|aall the crowd of spasoakers^a| in that one street town. Vainly virulence, violence & vituperation sought ^|awellnigh utterly^a| to end the reign of the great shipping mogul and linen lord; it was one ^|amore^a| dearer than all who was to make him ^|aa the^a| nine days' jeer ^|afor the lounge lizards^a| of the pumproom.

He had laid violent hands on himself^|a, lain down, fagged out, with equally melancholy death^a|. He had left the country by via a subterranean tunnel ^|a|blined shored^b| with bedboards^a|. ^|aAn infamous private ailment ^|b(variovenereal) (variolovenereal)^b| had claimed him. He had walked into a pond while intoxicated up to that point where ^|bbraces meet buttons braced skirts meet knickerbockers^b|. ^|bTen The^b| helping hands ^|bof five^b| had rescued him from seven feet of semifresh water. Aerials ^|breported the buzzed of a^b| finding of a bloody ^|bantichill cloak^b| with a tailor's tab reading V.P.H. & all shivered to think what beast had devoured him.^a| The black hand had done him in. On his postern had been nailed the title: Move up, Dumpty. Make room for Humpty! ^|aand this time no mistake the boys had done him in^a|. Indeed several wellwishers ^|abought went so far as to buy^a| copies of the evening editions just to make sure whether he was genuinely ^|aquite^a| dead. But on the morrow morn of ^|asuicide the suicidal murder ^|bunrescued^b|a| & expatriated half past ^|aeight ¼ to 9^a| o'clock saw the unfailing
{ms, 029}
spike of smoke plume punctual from his chimneypipe 7th gable and ten thirsty p.m.^|a, the lamps of maintenance lighted for the long night,^a| a suffusion of the leadlight panes.

^|aTherefore let it be neither said nor thought that the inhabitant of that sacred edifice was a parable merely nor ^|bmore strictly^b| h H.C.E a nonens. Not one of his many contemporaries seriously doubted or for long of his ^|breal legitimate^b| existence.^a|

Who then was the scourge of Lucalizod?, it was wont to be asked, as ^|a|bonce long ages behind^{b|a| |a}what became of where is^a| Peabody's money ^|aor and ^|b|clater later in time more to the point^c|b|a| who shot Buckley though every schoolgirl knows ^|athat by now how^a| it was Buckley who shot and ^|ahow it was^a| the Russian general & not Buckley who was shot? What ^|afullpay^a| poisonivy pry, ^|aor^a| which hatefilled woman? And that such ^|avarious vitriol of^a| venom a quiet stamp could cover!