Adventure Magazine Cover, November 10, 1924 — page 87: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

Tales of the Hot Dog Tavern 85 “Cutlas and knife, cutlas and knife; Blood’s the joy of a pirate’s life; I try my blade with a questing thumb; My throat is dry for a swig of rum, And I dream at night of the fights we fought The loot we took and the wreck we wrought, And I wake, and I wake with a thirst for gore As I did in the red raw days of yore, When I thrust and parried and killed for gold When I was a pirate bold. Cuilas and knife, cutlas and knife, Blood’s the joy of a pirate lifel’ ‘“That was the song he’d sing and then he’d mumble Strings of hot oaths that sort of seemed to rumble Straight up from hell. He was a merry chum To fad the night with. When the mornin’ come I'd lose my fright, but all day long he spoke Of all the people that he used to croak When he was buccaneerin’, an’ I’d sit, Drinkin’ in every syllable of it, Half-charmed, half-scared by his blasphemous tongue, An’ wonder how it was he hadn’t hung. But when the captain came an’ set me free, I says to him: ‘Say, Captain, do you see That hard old party with the ugly scar? I reckon there ain’t many, near or far That’s done more crimes. He’s sure a bad old bird.’ The captain laughs: “That bum? Say, ain’t you heard? He never even saw no buccaneers; He’s lived around this burg for forty years An’, havin’ read a lot of pirate bunk Whenever he is jailed for bein’ drunk, He gets some boob like you an’ fills him full With all that bunch of buccaneerin’ bull. That cut along his cheek he got complete By fallin’ through a window from the street. He’s harmless, kid, but slippin’ him his due, His cussin’ is surpassed by very few.’ ” ‘To get away from jails a while, I think If all you boys will join me in a drink Pll spin a yarn,” a customer declared. And while the bunch his liquid bounty shared, His narrative he hastened to unfold; And this is how his chronicle was told: “When I was a boy I had lots of ambition, But little enough of the cash; But, spite of my poverty stricken condition, (For, being a youth, I was rash.) I said to Miss Carrie O’ Leary— ‘I want you to marry me, dearie.’ But Carrie said tartly to me: ‘For sure youre a pleasant young chappy; = COmMICLMOOKKS.GO©