9.359 X's daughter

Humanist (mccarty@phoenix.Princeton.EDU)
Tue, 5 Dec 1995 19:15:43 -0500 (EST)

Humanist Discussion Group, Vol. 9, No. 359.
Center for Electronic Texts in the Humanities (Princeton/Rutgers)
http://www.princeton.edu/~mccarty/humanist/

[1] From: Jim Marchand <marchand@ux1.cso.uiuc.edu> (8)
Subject: X's Daughter

There used to be a whole series of X's Daughter jokes (?), of the structure:
She was only the X's daughter, but ... I'll give one harmless (?) example:
She was only the stableman's daughter, but all the horse manure (= horsemen
knew her). These were quite popular in the late 20's and early 30's of this
century, particularly in England, though not unknown in the American army in
WW II. As such things go, I imagine they extend much further back. I think
it was in the Utley Festschrift that I read an article which took Tex
Ritter's "Cowboy's Deck of Cards" back to the Middle Ages.
Jim Marchand.