Crest

CREST, n. An heraldic device displayed by the American descendants of Sir Crassus Vulgarius, Bearonet, one of the famous retainers of William the Corncurer.

Son of ten fathers! would you sport a crest

To honor one, ignoring all the rest.

The one who in his life you did disgrace

By taking on his name without his face?

His crest? The only one he knew, poor fool,

Adorned the dunce-cap that he wore at school.

Go paint a dandelion and a rag

Upon your panels, and then gravely brag

About their origin- how every panel

Proves that the founder of your line was Dan'l,

Who, cast among the lions' growling pack,

Contemptuously turned on them his back;

But one presuming brute, tradition teaches,

Tore with his tooth the seat of Dan'l's breeches.

'Twas thus the dent de lion and the rag

Became the arms of that illustrious wag.

And ever since each male of Dan'l's line,

Yourself included, as a pious sign

And token of his Scriptural descent,

Has worn a rag protruding from a rent.

2010 Update: An illustrated topknot by which American freemen may lay claim to European authority.