[This depiction of nudes in a garden was found printed on the cover of a Bible; it has nothing to do with the text of the present entry.]
(Cont.)
And it came to pass, when all the ivy leaguers which were on this side of the Great Basin Rainforest, in the hills, and in the valleys, and in all the coasts of the great sea over against Dartmouth, the Cornellian, and the Columbian, the Harvardite, the Princetonian, the Brunonian, and the Yalie, heard thereof; that they gathered themselves together, to do a meet-and-greet with the Volcano and with his workforce, with one accord.
However, when the members of Harvard’s Hasty Pudding Club heard what the Volcano had done in Las Vegas and Emerald City, and how Omega Zoroaster had magnified the likeness of Yeshua to be the Covering Cherub before the Gates of Oz, they conspired together, ahead of all their colleagues and fellows: and they set to work wilily, and dressed up as if they had been ambassadors, and took old sacks upon their asses, and wine bottles, old, and rent, and bound up; and they wore old loafers with patches upon their feet, and old garments upon them; and all the pizza that they brought for lunch was cold.
Then they set out on their asses like this, and headed toward the encampment of the Volcano at the Hanging Pond of the Basin. And, on arrival, the Harvardites of the Hasty Pudding Club bowed low and said:
“We come from a faraway land. We followed a star that led us here. Look: we brought offerings. Now we bow before you on our knees, and ask you in prayer, dear lords, please accept us into your fraternity.”
Now the Volcano was asleep at that moment, as was the rest of the workforce, because it was their weekend day of rest; so all the yogis and the gurus in the caravan answered and said:
“Hypothetically, let’s say that we decide to let you live (for we have half a mind to slay you, right here on the spot) – in that case, what exactly do you mean by begging us to ‘accept you into our fraternity’? Are you suggesting that we should put you through a hazing ritual?”
And the Harvardites said: “We are at your disposal. Whatever seems right to you, we will do.”
At this point, Yeshua the Zealot came out of his tent and gestured to the men from the Hasty Pudding Club, saying: “Who are these jokers? and what turnip truck did they fall from?”
Then the Harvardites in meekness answered Yeshua: “We began our trek here long ago; we come from a land that is far, far away. We studied the astrological tables and followed a star, which led us to you. It is our understanding that you are worshippers of the One True God Yahweh Peor – he is famous, where we come from, because of all that he did in the Empire (that is, the ancient one in Egypt, not the new one here in Las Vegas). We have heard all that he did to Fat Ug in Reno, how he accomplished the El Cortez operation, and made the hotel into a charnel house; also the prank that he played upon the Infraboreans, at the far side of the Great Basin Desert, which is now become a jungle: how he stuffed their King down a chimney, and crashed his sleigh, and burned all the presents that were in his delivery bag; then freed his electronic reindeer. On account of all this, the inhabitants of our province implored us, saying ‘Take enough cuisine with you for a banquet, and go to meet this nation, bearing sumptuous offerings, and greet the people of this High God, who is the savior of the world, and say to his Christ, “We will gladly serve your professorship as adjuncts, even as unpaid interns; therefore, position us on the lowest caste in your system: only allow us to join your fraternity.”’ Take note, these containers of pizza were hot when we left our huts, but now that we have traveled so long to get here, they have turned cold. And these bottles of wine, when we filled them, were new; yet, behold, now they are scuffed up, cracked, and shattered: likewise, our outfits are now out of fashion, from the lengthy journey.”
Then, having listened to this speech, the leadership of the workforce accepted the meager gifts that the Pudding Club had brought; but they did not consult with the rest of the masses or wake the Volcano to ask him if this was a good idea.
And Yeshua the Zealot spared the lives of the Harvardites; and he made peace with them, and allowed them to join his fraternity. And the yogis and the gurus caused the Hasty Pudding Club to swear an oath. And they developed an elaborate hazing ritual, which gratified the yogis and the gurus while humiliating the club members.
“This is convenient,” said the men of the leadership, one to another, “for since these Harvardites live so very far away, their nation will never get word of how inhumanely we are treating them.”
Yet it happened that only three days after they had accepted them into their fraternity, the yogis and gurus discovered that these Harvardites were not at all what they had claimed to be: instead of having wandered from afar, these men were, in actuality, their next-door neighbors! For the headquarters of the Hasty Pudding Club was located on Dunster Street in Cambridge: just two blocks away from the workers’ encampment. The leadership discovered this fact by accident, one afternoon, while they were out taking a walk.
This was bad news for the yogis and gurus, for it meant that they could no longer enjoy hermetic secrecy when maltreating the Harvardites, but there was always the danger that their fellow countrymen would find out, since so many sibling cliques existed within earshot. Beside the Pudding, for instance, both the Porcellian Club and the Fly Club had established their own cities in the vicinity, as did the sect called Alpha Delta Phi.
And the yogis and gurus were unable simply to cannibalize these Harvardites, because Yeshua had granted them a peace treaty; moreover, the covenant that the men signed when they joined the fraternity guaranteed that, despite bad treatment, their lives would be spared. So all that the yogis and gurus could do was murmur.
Now when Yeshua the Zealot walked past and heard them griping about this, he said to the yogis and the gurus of the workforce: “I remind you all that we vowed not to genocide these men.”
And the yogis and gurus answered Yeshua, saying: “But what are we to do, if we must not utterly extinguish them, since they lied to us about the proximity of their homeland! Behold, this is a threat to our national security.”
And Yeshua pondered in silence for a great while; then at last he answered: “Here is what we shall do. We must let them live, lest we waken the wrath of the volcano of potential, who does not take lightly the breaking of mutual covenants. But let the Harvardites that joined our fraternity serve for aye as an underclass of our caravansary. Let us deal with them as subhumans, and use them how immigrants are treated in any Empire. Set taskmasters over them, to afflict them with burdens: force them to hew our wood and draw our water. Demand that they build us treasure cities: let them serve with rigor; and make their lives bitter with hard bondage, in mortar, and in brick, and in all manner of service in the field. And if they beg to be shown mercy, because the labors under which we have oppressed them are impossible to bear, then let us refuse to lighten their load: instead, let us heap greater demands upon them, and accuse them of being idle complainers.”
So the yogis and gurus called the Harvardites into a private office, and they spoke to them harshly, saying: “You have beguiled us, claiming that you come from a faraway land, when the truth is that your homebase is nearby, in Harvard Square. Now therefore all of you are cursed: you shall spend the rest of your lives in servitude, as bondmen to our fraternity, doing all the hard work that we ourselves rate unpleasant.”
Then the Harvardites answered and said: “Just consider how we felt, when we saw how the image of your warrior Yeshua was elevated on high above the gateway to Oz, as the anointed cherub guarding the city, with his breastplate covered with precious green gems and stones of fire; after we had beheld how the Volcano permitted your battalions, under the leadership of Moses, to pillage the lands west of here, and to merge with the Midianites and other magi of the wilderness. And seeing how their pantheon of deities favored you. All this turned our spine to jelly, and we trembled in fear: that is why we put on this show for you, and fabricated our origin story. So, now, this is checkmate: we are in your hands, and at your mercy. Go ahead and do with us whatever seems right for you to do. What say have we? We Harvardites are utterly powerless; whereas you workers of the world are favored by the volcano of potential.”
Therefore, in the end, the caravan’s leadership honored their vow: They forewent subjecting the members of the Hasty Pudding Club to a firing squad, and instead condemned them to a lifetime of indentured servitude.
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