[Illustration]

CHAPTER IX

THE FACE OF THE GLOBE

There are no good photographs of the Giddy Globe; she refuses to sit.

Imagine attempting to photograph an obese and flighty Spheroid who
spends her time pirouetting round in a circle with all her might and
main.

Perhaps it is to avoid the photographer that the Earth spins, and not
merely to reduce her girth as we hinted elsewhere.

In these days such a strenuous evasion of publicity is suspicious.

Where does she come from?

Where is she going?

She refuses to answer, she will not even state her business or tell her
real name.

For aeons (quite a number of aeons) this Giddy one has been going round
under various male and female aliases such as--Cosmos, Mother Earth, The
World, Mrs. Grundy, the Footstool, the Terrestrial Globe.

If you look up her record you will find the following press notices--

"The Earth's a thief."
Timon of Athens.

"Earth's bitter."
Wordsworth.

"This distracted Globe."
Hamlet.

"This tough World."
King Lear.

"Naughty World."
Merchant of Venice.

"This World is given to Lying."
Henry IV.

"The World is too much with us."
Wordsworth.

"The World is grown so bad."
Richard III.

"The narrow World."
Julius Caesar.

"The World is not thy friend."
Romeo and Juliet.

"The World's a bubble."
Bacon.

"This World is all a fleeting show."
Moore.

"The World was not worthy."
St. Paul.

"The World's a tragedy."
Horace Walpole.

"This bleak World."
Moore.

"The weary weight of all this unintelligible World."
Wordsworth.

"A World of vile ill-favoured faults."
Merry Wives of Windsor.

"Stale, flat and unprofitable seem to me all the uses of this World."
Hamlet.

"This dim spot that men call Earth."
Milton.

"The wicked World."
W. S. Gilbert.

It is possible that the Giddy Globe has read the above clippings and,
realizing that she has been discovered, spins round with all her might
to avoid being photographed for the Rogues' Gallery of the Universe.

Appearances are certainly against her.

* * *

_When I am moved to contemplate_
_The rude and unregenerate state_
_Of that rampageous reprobate_
_The World at large,_
_And as I