How Punny

The poet Charles Lamb really loved puns. On one occasion, upon “being told that somebody had lampooned him,” he remarked, “Very well, I’ll Lamb-pun him!”

All that must please!

February gives us Valentine's Day, a day which the Amateur Historian's friends tend to spend watching Jane Austen and Bronte adaptations. I think any adaptation of a nineteenth century novel would benefit from having Hugh Laurie and Stephen Fry derail the accepted script, and, of course, Emma Thompson makes everything better just by being in the shot.

Oeuf!

The Marquis de Condorcet was widely held to be a philosophe and one of the last members of the Enlightenment. However, that did not keep him from moments of great stupidity.

While in hiding during the Terror, Condorcet, wounded in the leg and disheveled, ordered an omlette in an inn.

"How many eggs would you like?" asked the inn-keeper, somewhat alarmed by his guest's wild appearance.

Condorcet, being an aristocrat, had no idea, and thus said, "Twelve."

The inn-keeper then realized he was an aristocrat on the run, and reported him to the authorities.

Condorcet certainly had egg on his face for that one.

(Get the title? It's a pun! Oof/oeuf? They sound the same, but one is the French word for egg?Fine, Gentle Reader, you simply do not posses the sophisticated appreciation of wordplay that the Amateur Historian does.)