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FOOLISH FEAR.
fear. Whereat the mother addressed the Judge, saying:
"Monseigneur, thou hast heard the confession of my daughter, and the defence of my son-in-law. I beg of thee give judgement forthwith."
The Judge gave orders for a bed to be prepared in his house, the couple to lie on it together; and he commanded the bride boldly to lay hold of the tilting staff,[1] and put it where it was ordered to go. When this judgement was delivered, the mother said:
"I thank thee, my lord; thou hast judged well. Come, my child, do what thou shouldst, and take heed to obey the Judge, and put the lance where it should be put."
"I am satisfied," answered the daughter, "to put it where it ought to go, but it may rot there ere I take it out again."
- ↑ Mr. Douglas translates simply:..."stick or instrument." The word in the text, bourdon, signifies literally "a pilgrim's staff." It is followed by the word joustouer, "to tilt or joust," or "a tiller, a jouster," which Mr. Douglas ignores. The combination, however, seems to keep more faithfully to the spirit of the story. On the other hand, bourdon is a recognised erotic term for penis. Farmer, (Slang and its Analogues: vol. 5, p. 290), quotes Rabelais as employing the word in this sense. Landes, (Glossaire érotique de la langue française: Brussels, 1861), includes it in a list which comprises 212 slang terms for the male organ of generation. Le petit Citateur: Notes èrotiques et pornographiques: Paris, 1881: only 300 printed, a curious and valuable little work dealing with the lesser known expressions and metaphors of venry, and intended to serve as a complement to the ordinary erotic dictionary, describes bourdon as "the virile member, the grand chord which gives the note in the amorous duet." The Memoirs of Miss Fanny are quoted: "… enraptured, split open by the enormous size of my ravisher's bourdon, my thighs all bloodstained, I remained for some time overwhelmed by fatigue and pleasure..." The French text referred to in the foregoing not is that of Garnir Frères, Paris, n.d.
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