Dr Crafty and Professor Cunning

Once upon a time, in a far off country lived a man called Dr Crafty, who was always cooking up clever schemes on how to get rich at the expense of other people, just because he never wanted to work hard and live by his own sweat.

One day he borrowed a huge amount of money, with interest, from a very wealthy but miserly fellow known as Professor Cunning. The loan agreement stated that in the event Dr Crafty fails to settle the debt, then ‘everything about and concerning Dr Crafty goes to Professor Cunning’. Dr. Crafty, the mean and crooked fellow that he was, had no intention of paying back the debt. He hatched what he thought was a clever plan with his long-suffering wife. “My wife, you know I borrowed a lot of gold from that miser, Professor Cunning.

This is a good chance for us to get rich. I will not pay that money back. I will pretend to be dead and you will start wailing. Then you will announce to the towns people that it was my wish that I be buried in my native village when I die. You will then pack our belongings and take my ‘dead body’ and live the town. We will go to a town very far from here and start a new life, as rich people of course.

So Dr Crafty and his wife executed the plan. He pretended to be dead and his wife started wailing. When Professor Cunning heard of it, he became suspicious, and hatched his own plan. He went to Dr. Crafty’s house, where mourners had gathered. After commiserating with Mrs Crafty, the professor requested to be briefly left alone with Dr. Crafty’s ‘dead body’, so as to pay his last respects to his deceased friend in a special way. While alone inside the room with the ‘dead’ Dr.Crafty, Professor Cunning said: “Oh, my friend, Dr. Crafty, if only you knew what you were having while you were alive.

If only you knew why I agreed to lend you such a large sum of money. If only you knew that I discovered that buried under this your wretched house are valuable treasures worth millions in money, treasures that were buried here hundreds of years ago. That was why I made it a condition that everything belonging to you becomes mine if you fail to pay back the money I borrowed you. Hee hee..good thing you died. That makes it easier for me.

The moment your wife steps out of this town with your body, then I will claim your house, dig up the treasures and become the richest man in the world.” On hearing these words, the ‘dead’ Dr Crafty quickly sprang up and shouted at the Professor. “No way! I was just pretending to be dead. Those treasures are mine, not yours.  I will dig them up and become the richest man in the world.” Professor Cunning smiled and said: “I suspected that you did not die. I made up the story in order to raise you from your fake death. You can dig under your house as much as you can, but pay me back what you owe me now, fast!”


Inside the court

One day, a very poor and hungry man called Mr. Huto was walking past a restaurant belonging to a pesky and capricious lady called ‘Mean Old Madam Mim’. The aroma of the delicious food being cooked at the restaurant wafted across the street. It was so appetising that Mr Huta decided to linger around the place for a while in order to sniff the air carrying the aroma and smack his tongue. Since he had no money to buy the food, he soon made it a habit to loiter around the restaurant at a particular time of the day, so as to savour the pleasant aroma. But Madam Mim soon got to know about What Huta was doing, and pronto, sued him to court.

At the court she told the judge how Huta used to loiter near her restaurant to sniff the aroma from her food, instead of coming in to buy. After listening to her complaint, the judge ordered the court clerk to bring a long cane and give to Madam Mim. The clerk did so. The judge then told her to use the cane to beat Huta’s shadow twelve times. Mean old Madam Mim did so. “Case closed now,” said the judge.


The words of a mad fellow

Many people wonder what pushed Adolf Hitler into what he did. However, reading some of his writings gives one an insight into what was his warped mind. Below is an extract from his racist and delusive notion of ‘Aryan’ superiority.

All the human culture, all the results of art, science and technology that we see before us today, are almost exclusively the creative product of the Aryan.  This very fact admits of the not unfounded inference that that he alone was the founder of all higher humanity, therefore representing the prototype of all that we understand by the word ‘man’.

He is the Prometheus of mankind from whose bright forehead the divine spark of genius has sprung at all times, forever kindling anew that fire of knowledge which illuminated the night of silent mysteries and thus caused man to climb their path to mastery over the other beings on earth. Exclude him, and perhaps after a few thousand years darkness will again descend on the earth, human culture will pass, and the world turn to desert.

If we were to divide mankind into three groups, the founders of culture, the bearers of culture, only the Aryan could be considered as the representastive of the first group. From him originate the foundations and wills of all human creation, and only the outward form and colour are determined by the changing traits of character of the various peoples. He provides the mightiest building stones and plans for all human progress and only the execution corresponds to the nature of the varying men and races.

Blood mixture and the resultant drop in the racial level is the sole cause of the dying out of old cultures; for men do not perish as a result of lost wars; but by the loss of that force of resistance which is contained only in pure blood.

Poem

Ballad of Roosevelt
The rent was due,
And the lights was out.
I said, Tell me mama,
What’s it all about?
We’re waiting on Roosevelt, son,
 Roosevelt, Roosevelt,
Just waiting on Roosevelt.

Then one day
They put us out of the house.
Ma and Pa was
Meek as a mouse
 Still waitin’ on Roosevelt,
 Roosevelt, Roosevelt,
But when they felt those
Cold winds blow
And didn’t have no
Place to go
 Pa said, I’m tired
 O’ waitin’ on Roosevelt,
 Roosevelt, Roosevelt.

And a lot o’ other folks
What’t hungry and cold
Done stopped believin’
What they had been told
By Roosevelt
 Roosevelt, Roosevelt
Cause the pot’s still empty,
And the cupboard’s still bare,
And you can’t build a bungalow
Out o’ air-
Mr Roosevelt, listen!
What’s the matter here?

Langston Hughes