Old-Fashioned Fruitcake
An overbearing townie wants to buy Pippi Longstocking’s cottage and pull it down. What will she do?
Without delay, she seized the fine gentleman about his fat waist and threw him up in the air, twice. Then she carried him at arm’s length to his car and threw him into the back seat.
“From the carpet bag she took out seven flannel nightgowns, four cotton ones, a pair of boots, a set of dominoes, two bathing-caps and a postcard album.”
This is in addition to the previous appearance of “a starched white apron… a large cake of Sunlight Soap, a toothbrush, a packet of hairpins, a bottle of scent, a small folding armchair and a box of throat lozenges.”
Clearly, Miss Mary Poppins is mindful of the Scout motto to Be Prepared.
To the great Variety of Readers.
From the moſt able, to him that can but ſpell: There you are number’d. We had rather you were weighd. Eſpecially, when the fate of all Bookes depends vpon your capacities : and not of your heads alone, but of your purſes. Well! It is now publique, & you wil ſtand for your priuiledges wee know : to read, and cenſure. Do ſo, but buy it firſt.
from the Introduction to the First Folio edition of Shakespeare’s Works, 1623.
