On the editorial page of the Harvard Lampoon, set in small type beneath a masthead of multi-initialled cognomina, is the turgid legend: "No matter in this magazine to be reprinted without permission of publishers." Under this code, reproduction of the following is positively prohibited:

Captain: "Would you like to see my bridge!"

Lady Passenger: "Sir!"

The chain reaction that led to such drollery started back in 1876, when, according to the chroniclers, Ralph Curtis '76, "celebrated for his skill at caricature," Samuel Sherwood '76, "a clever draughtsman," and Arthur Sherwood '77, "the life of every party which he joined," put their moustaches together in a back room of Matthews Hall and founded "The Harvard Lampoon, or Cambridge Charivari. Illustrated, Humorous, Etc." One of the earliest editions--a collectors' item if that's your idea of a good time--carried, in addition to advertisements for "Silk Smoking Caps, Japanese" and "Brier-wood and Meerschaum Pipes, Gambier Bowls, and Toilet Articles," a pen-and-ink drawing of two typical Harvard students ensconced in a gaslit chamber. One gentleman, collared in celluloid, is reclining in a lace-fringed chair, smoking a catarrh cigarette and casually flicking ashes into a brass spittoon. The other is standing firmly before the fireplace, warming the seat of his blue serge pants, and the conversation runs as follows:

Fred (to chum): "I dreamt about you last night, Bob!"

Bob: "I hope it was pleasant!"

Fred: "O yes! Very pleasant while it lasted. I dreamt you paid the ten dollars you owe me."

When George Santayana '86, said of the Lampoon, ". . . always late and not always funny," he was, to the best knowledge of the reading public, making one of his most timeless statements. In the very latest issue, for example, there is a somewhat autobiographical piece by a writer who describes himself as having "the appearance of a second-hand, dejected tea-bag" and whose prose style is, in most respects, consistent with his aspect. The cartoon on page seven of the same copy, portraying a successful caricature of the late Roger B. Merriman patting the head of a small Freshman, and carrying the caption "Saturday, September 21. Freshman advisers. 'Drop in again. Any time. Next May, for instance'," is adequate testimony to the popular saw that the old gags are still the best.

The machinery that has been grinding out monthly chuckles for almost three generations of Cantabrigians is set between three walls of the island fortress that guards the Mount Auburn Street approaches to the Gold Coast Valeteria. The structure is fraught with symbolic significance. The western tip was designed to depict a smiling face, while the eastern end is said to represent a clothing store. But accurate description pales beside the comment of a tourist from the Middle West, who, pulling his ear up in front of Adams House one day last summer, squinted across the street, turned to his wife and mused, "I wonder what church that is."