George Macbeth, apparently.
THE RED HERRING (George Macbeth)
There was once a high wall, a bare wall.
And against this wall, there was a ladder,
a long ladder. And on the ground, under
the ladder, there was a red herring. A dry
red herring.
And then a man came along. And in his hands
(they were dirty hands) this man had a heavy hammer,
A long nail (it was a sharp nail) and a ball of string
A thick ball of string.
All right. So the man climbed up.
the ladder (right to the top)
and knocked in the sharp nail;
Splunk! Just like that.
Right on top of the wall. The bare wall.
Then, he dropped the hammer. It dropped right down
to the ground. And onto the nail,
he tied a piece of string, a long
piece of string, and onto the string
he tied the red herring. The dry red herring.
And let it drop. And then he climbed
down the ladder (right down
to the bottom), picked up the hammer
and also the ladder (which was pretty heavy)
and went off. A long way off.
And since then, the red herring, the dry
red herring hung on the end of the string, which is
quite a long string, has been
very very slowly swinging and
swinging to a stop. A full stop.
I expect you wonder why I made
up this story, such a simple story. Well,
I did it just to annoy people.
Serious people. And perhaps also
to amuse children. Small children.