Deposit

DEPOSIT, n. A charitable contribution to the support of a bank.

2010 Update: A portion of there allocated to the establishment of a new here.

Defaulter

DEFAULTER, n. An important officer in a bank, who commonly adds to his regular functions the duties of cashier.

2010 Update: A restitutionary revolutionary. The median American.

Defame

DEFAME, v.t. To lie about another. To tell the truth about another.

2010 Update: To martyr without slaying, a shameful waste of piety.

And happy birthday to Eamon!

Decide

DECIDE, v.i. To succumb to the preponderance of one set of influences over another set.

A leaf was riven from a tree,
"I mean to fall to earth," said he.

The west wind, rising, made him veer.
"Eastward," said he, "I now shall steer."

The east wind rose with greater force.
Said he: "'Twere wise to change my course."

With equal power they contend.
He said: "My judgment I suspend."

Down died the winds; the leaf, elate,
Cried: "I've decided to fall straight."

"First thoughts are best?" That's not the moral;
Just choose your own and we'll not quarrel.

Howe'er your choice may chance to fall,
You'll have no hand in it at all.
—G.J.

2010 Update: To offer destiny a consideration.

Decanter

DECANTER, n. A vessel whose functions are most envied by the human stomach.

2010 Update: An ornamental middle station between bottle and glass designed to contain the difference between wine- and whiskey-drinkers for proper aeration.

Decalogue

DECALOGUE, n. A series of commandments, ten in number — just enough to permit an intelligent selection for observance, but not enough to embarrass the choice. Following is the revised edition of the Decalogue, calculated for this meridian.

Thou shalt no God but me adore:
'Twere too expensive to have more.

No images nor idols make
For Robert Ingersoll to break.

Take not God's name in vain; select
A time when it will have effect.

Work not on Sabbath days at all,
But go to see the teams play ball.

Honor thy parents. That creates
For life insurance lower rates.

Kill not, abet not those who kill
Thou shalt not pay thy butcher's bill.

Kiss not thy neighbor's wife, unless
Thine own thy neighbor doth caress

Don't steal; thou'lt never thus compete
Successfully in business. Cheat.

Bear not false witness — that is low —
But "hear 'tis rumored so and so."

Covet thou naught that thou hast not
By hook or crook, or somehow, got.
—G.J.

2010 Update: The ten commandments as described by scholarly atheists who observe the laws in failure rather than in speech.

Debt

DEBT, n. An ingenious substitute for the chain and whip of the slave-driver.

As, pent in an aquarium, the troutlet
Swims round and round his tank to find an outlet,
Pressing his nose against the glass that holds him,
Nor ever sees the prison that enfolds him;
So the poor debtor, seeing naught around him,
Yet feels the narrow limits that impound him,
Grieves at his debt and studies to evade it,
And finds at last he might as well have paid it.
—Barlow S. Vode

2010 Update: Consent and cement.

Dead

DEAD, adj.

Done with the work of breathing; done
With all the world; the mad race run
Through to the end, the golden goal
Attained-amd found to be a hole!
Ignoble end to all the strife!
To lie as ne'er we lay in life,
with legs uncomfortably straight
And rigid fixity of pate,
{ierced through and through by worms that live
To make, with needless skill, a sieve
Out of our skin, to sift our dust.
Vain labor! at the last they just
Bolt us unbolted till they bu'st!
-Squatol Johnes

2010 Update: Concise.

Dividing by two

Noah filled his might ship

With pairs of he and she,

And no record from that trip

Upon that wrathful sea

Suggest he suffered confoundation

O'er any critter's assignation.

And yet it seems we modern brothers

Despite our gentle waves

Have trouble telling some from others

Or comparing cribs and graves.

God blessed Noah with more than warning

To know first night from fortieth morning.

And as we struggle to discern,

What distinctions now elude us?

The more we know and more we learn

The more the wise neighbor colludes

The more the scholar deeply delves

The less comes between objects and ourselves.

The stormy, wrath-roiled, boiling sea

That washed the ark to Ararat

Or the modern, gridhewn clarity?

I cannot choose 'tween ours and that

Though the foaming waves reflect much clearer

Than the peaceful lake flat as a mirror.

-Friedrich Schiller

DISCRIMINATION, n. The faculty to behave differently towards distinctive entities, such as discretion and bigotry or subjects and objects.

The Routes of Laredo

I crossed a man upon the road

In cloak and hat and glasses,

He stepped and leapt from shade to tree

And whispers as he passes.

We came upon, the sneak and I,

A third man in the ditch

Mugged or stabbed or well run-down,

I couldn't tell you which.

Alarmed we were, the spy and I,

To that I can attest,

By the bruises on the third man's head

And the cuts upon his breast.

"Go send for the doctor and the preacher as well,"

The hidden man's nod did imply.

And seeing the paranoid by the came-to-harm,

I gladly ran off to comply.

When I returned, their senses had left them

The injured lay dead under cloak

The sneak, in his skivvies, was stuck in the boughs,

Hiding, I think, though we never spoke.

Beat the drum slowly and play the fife lowly,

There's a lesson if you'd like to hear it-

If you're scared or unlucky, stay quiet and home,

Wherever you're heading, it's right that you fear it.

DESTINATION, n. The stop past your station.

Happy birthday eve to Actonbell!

Dependent

DEPENDENT, adj. Reliant upon another's generosity for the support which you are not in a position to exact from his fears.

2010 Update: Worthy of charity and faith, but not hope.

Debauchee

DEBAUCHEE, n. One who has so earnestly pursued pleasure that he has had the misfortune to overtake it.

2010 Update: A woman whose ingenuousness succumbs to her ingenuity.

Day

DAY, n. A period of twenty-four hours, mostly misspent. This period is divided into two parts, the day proper and the night, or day improper — the former devoted to sins of business, the latter consecrated to the other sort. These two kinds of social activity overlap.

2010 Update: A unit of explanation equal to 96 Ennuis.

Darling

DARLING, n. The bore of opposite sex in an early stage of development.

2010 Update: The apple of an orchard-keeper's eye. A term of elevation befitting the condescended.

Daring

DARING, n. One of the most conspicuous qualities of a man in security.

2010 Update: A laudable trait in a stranger surrounded by my neighbors.

Dandy

DANDY, n. One who professes a singularity of opinion with regard to his own merits, accentuating his eccentricity with his clothes.

2010 Update: A person usually male.

Dandle

DANDLE, v.t. To set an unresisting child upon one's knee and jolt its teeth loose in a transport of affection. A grown girl may be similarly outraged, but her teeth being more firmly secure, there can be no object in doing so, and the custom is a mere mechanical survival of a habit acquired by practice on babes and suckling.

If you care not for the scandal

You can hold a girl and dandle

Her upon your knee all night;

But the game's not worth the candle

When 'tis played by candle light.

But whene'er you feel the yearning,

And the candle isn't burning-

Or at least not very bright,

The the little game concerning

Which I sing is very quite.

2010 Update: To prepare young tykes for the ascensive drubbings that replace affection away from the familial knee.

Dad

DAD, n. A father whom his vulgar children do not respect.

2010 Update: A candidate for promotion, every Father's Day, to father.

Dextrality

DEXTRALITY, n. The state of being on the right side. See POLITICIAN.

You will always find me on the right side, sir; always! I cannot afford to get left! -Gen. McComb

2010 Update: The likelihood that one will pick your left pocket.

Desertion

DESERTION, n. An aversion to fighting, as exhibited by abandoning an army or a wife.

2010 Update: The sacrifice of freedom for liberty.

It's desertion when you leave your post

Of honor with your nation's host,

And desertion when you leave your spouse

Alone within your furnished house.

But there's no noisy tsking frission,

When an inmate flees the prison-

For in escape we find no vice

While desertion demands sacrifice.

-Ssgt. Peyton Farquhar