Harley Shum

OLEAGINOUS, adj. Oily, smooth, sleek.

Disraeli once described the manner of Bishop Wilberforce as

"unctuous, oleaginous, saponaceous." And the good prelate was ever

afterward known as Soapy Sam. For every man there is something in the

vocabulary that would stick to him like a second skin. His enemies

have only to find it.

OLYMPIAN, adj. Relating to a mountain in Thessaly, once inhabited by

gods, now a repository of yellowing newspapers, beer bottles and

mutilated sardine cans, attesting the presence of the tourist and his

appetite.

His name the smirking tourist scrawls

Upon Minerva's temple walls,

Where thundered once Olympian Zeus,

And marks his appetite's abuse.

The Devil's Dictionary · 第 126 / 189 题