For Those Who Are Bored
General Boulanger and Haiti
O Fortune, blind goddess! How cruel are your blows!...The brav'general atoned for the dazzling success of a day with a dizzying and profound fall. This fall is all the more irremediable because it is henceforth consecrated by dreadful puns. Listen on:
Yesterday, a very respectable Monsieur came up to me and said: "Did you know that Boulanger almost went to Haiti... as President!" "Ah bah!" "It's true! It seems that a charlatan tried to convince him, at the time of your last revolution, that it could happen. It would, after all, have aligned with the nature of things: The Black Republic would have for its leader General Boule en jais!"
Horrible, no?...
Poor general!...
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Note: The pun, of course, is lost in translation; boule en jais, which sounds like "Boulanger," means jet black head.