Ottumwa tri-weekly courier. [volume] (Ottumwa, Iowa) 1903-1916, 1906-02-15
"How Old.
is Ann"
Beaten.

ly discounts the
is Ann" How Old Is >Ann"
puzzle: When Shake
Beaten. speare became the
father of twins he
was mere boy and at first was in
clined to make a rough house, and
wrote THE Tempest" but "ref1ecting
on the atrocity of his Intentions" he
afterward recanted, and wrote the
Comedy of Errors" In order to do
this he had to have two sets of twins
that looked SO much alike that you
couldn't tell two duck eggs apart so
he fguratively bought pair and let
himself out the whole length. He first
made one set of twins servants to
the other set, and then had the father
and one twin and his "boughten'' twin
get lost from the mother of the other
twin and his "boughten" twin He did
this so it would be easy to understand
the all-around relationship. Then he
quick.
The other twins couldn't tell one
twins twin when he saw him from his
own twin, although his own twin was
his brother, and so his brothers.
twins twin was his servant, which
made him his own twin, too. But
Shakespeare was cute, he named both
the first twins Antipholus, and the
span that he bought were both named
Dromio; this was done as an evidence
of good faith. Dromio was the twin
of Antipholus because his father
bought him and gave him to Antiphol-
us. and Antipholus was the twin Of An
tipholus. too Dromio was the twin
of Dromio, because he was born of the
same mother at the same time, but
both Antipholus's were born of the
same mother at the same time, also
Now the two Dromios were the two
twins Of the two Antipholus's, that is
very plain anyhow. and the two Anti
pholus's had each twin Dromio, and
also twin Antipholus. This made
two sets Of triplets Of the original
four, six altogether.
Now the old man, whose name was
Aegion, had the two twins and he
bought each Of them twin, which
made each twin have two twins apiece,
and each of the twins twins had a
twin, this made eight. But here the
sagaoity Of Mr.. Shakespeare begins to
take on added luster. His own twins
had the collie, and he began to count
them to see how many there were Of
them and finally figured up that Mrs
Aegion also had a pair of twins, and
each Of these had two twins, which
made six, and each Of the twins twins
had twin, that made eight; so that
made sixteen altogether. Then Mr..
Shakespeare began to sing sixteen
songs in sixteen languages to the six
teen twins to quiet them, while Mis-
tress Anne, whom he had rescued
from being an old maid just in time
to become the mother Of the twins,
was making arm holes in the corners
of a couple dozen. pillow slips to use
for emergency shirts for the twins.
No wonder Mr.. Shakespeare could
write on diversity of subjects. But
he wasn't Satisfied with only sixteen
twins In his Comedy of Errors" but
must needs marry them off, and after
having married a couple of them, then
came the fun. The wives couldn't tell
their husbands from the other fellow
and after bit the other fellow wasn't
sure himself whether he was himself
or his brother and the Dromios were
| just as bad. They were like man
turned loose In a room surrounded by
mirrors, when they started to get
away from themselves they met them
selves coming back. One Dromio
got threshed for the other ones mis-
demeanor and the culprit got pie. The
twin business was a big thing for Mr..
Shakespeare. II he could have found
a couple OF pair of females and took
a week to match them up, he could
have started q Chautauqua and furn.
ished the audience and had twins left.
We don't know OF case Of twinpho-
! bia more pronounced than was Mr..
/ Shakespeare's. 1t all came Of marry.
4 ing an old maid who raised him twins.