Page:While the Billy Boils, 1913.djvu/328

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BOGG OF GEEBUNG


At the local police court, where the subject of this sketch turned up periodically amongst the drunks, he had 'James' prefixed to his name for the sake of convenience and as a matter of form previous to his being fined forty shillings (which he never paid) and sentenced to 'a month hard' (which he contrived to make as soft as possible). The local larrikins called him 'Grog,' a very appropriate name, all things considered; but to the Geebung Times he was known until the day of his death as 'a well-known character named Bogg.' The antipathy of the local paper might have been accounted for by the fact that Bogg strayed into the office one day in a muddled condition during the absence of the staff at lunch and corrected a revise proof of the next week's leader, placing bracketed 'query' and 'see proof' marks opposite the editor's most flowery periods and quotations, and leaving on the margin some general advice to the printers to 'space better,' &c. He also corrected a Latin quotation or two, and added a few ideas of his own in good French.

But no one, with the exception of the editor of the Times, ever dreamed that there was anything out of

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