Soliloquy of the Vanquished.

I am
The Bubonic Plague;
There is just one thing on
Earth that I
Am afraid of, and that
Is Kentucky.
It’s the
Only thing that’s
Severer and less scrupulous
Or discreet
Than I.
It don’t five a (Well, you know
What the “cunnels” would say)
For anything or anybody;
It don’t even
Tell you to move when you’re
In front of the target’ it
Just shoots and shoots.
It don’t care for the decency of
The country, or its reputation.
It is just one continual
Round of broils, from
Year to year,
Regardless. It is a
Worse blot, and more in need of
Quarantining than either
Me, the cholera, or
Dr. Hurty’s smallpox.
It is a festering sore, a fe-
Ver blister, a cancer, an abscess,
A carbuncle, and it needs
Treatment.
I am vanquished; it outclasses
Me, and I will not be imported,
Either microbially
Or otherwise,
To the United States until Kentucky is
Rendered less obnoxious
I’m Jealous.

Dr. Hurty has a large assortment of bubonic microbes on the way to Indiana, and he expects to be able to sic them on us some time during the next two years. At present his smallpox microbes are beginning to look a little pale around the gills, but the doctor is nothing daunted and announces that his bubonic microbes will be the real thing. He has the microbe business down pat and is perhaps more familiar with their habits and characteristics than any living man. He knows their history from away back, and there has never been a microbe yet that was smart enough to fool him on its ancestry or family relations. – Decatur Journal.

“Soliloquy of the Vanquished,” The Indianapolis Journal (Indianapolis, Indiana), 12 March 1900, p. 4, col. 4, 5; digital image, Chronicling America (http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/ : accessed 6 December 2014).