Inside Jacket

The monster looks a bit like the rubbery squid from the Bud Light advert. Jane Austen must be turning in her grave.

Once again the mob has spoken, and we have your winner right here…

….You can see all the entries, i’ve fast forwarded to the winners bracket.

Those of you who love the Twilight parody book Nightlight will enjoy this New Moon movie parody called Guinew Moon.  Watch it and laugh!

A first edition of Charles Darwin’s On the Origin Of Species, which languished for years in a toilet (that’s on a shelf, not in the cistern), is to be auctioned this week – it’s the 150th anniversary of this famous book on November 24. It must have been a very upmarket house to have a Darwin first edition in the Khazi.

Speaking of Origin of the Species, check out our feature about the ‘Evolution of the Origin of Species’ – 150 years of cover design.

As Encyclopaedia Britannica begins a hunt for the oldest privately-held edition, The Telegraph has published a list of 10 rather odd and wonderful “facts” about our world as written in 1768. (I checked AbeBooks listings and 1771 appears to be the oldest edition offered.)

For your amusement, here’s Encyclopaedia Britannica 1768: 10 weird facts courtesy of The Telegraph:

1. Humans and monsters

Homo sapiens were sub divided into five varieties: the American, the European, the Asiatic, the African and the monstrous.

2. Medicine

Cures for flatulence included drinking chamomile tea and blowing smoke from a pipe ‘through the anus.’

Visiting the dentist was, literally, a pain in the backside; cures for toothache include drinking laxatives, or bleeding in the foot. If the tooth is rotten ‘it will be best to burn the nervous cord which is the seat of the pain with a cautery; and then the cavity may be filled up with a mixture of wax and maslich’. Or, the French way was to fill the hole with another human/animal tooth of the right size.

Drinking tea or coffee was a common cure for heart-burn. Alternatively hot wine infused with camomile flowers and sugar was also thought to work.

3. Chocolate consumption

Chocolate was a luxury, and ready made chocolate and cacao paste were prohibited to be imported from overseas. It could, however, be made at home for private use ‘upon three days notice given to the officer of excise, and provided no less than half an hundred weight be made at one time.’

4. Aphrodisiacs

Vermicelli noodles were first brought from Italy, where the food was in ‘great vogue’; it was chiefly used in soups and pottages, ‘to provoke venery’ or sexual gratification.

5. Petrol

Petroleum was used as an ointment to treat pains of the limbs, and to try and cure paralysis.

6. Australia and New Zealand

Despite the fact that both lands had been discovered their existence was not recognised in the Encyclopaedia until they had been colonised.

7. California

The US state of Callifornia was spelt with two ‘L’s’ and is described as ‘a large country of the West Indies. Unknown whether it is an island or a peninsula.’

8. The solar system

The solar system was described as having six planets; Uranus, Neptune and Pluto have yet to be discovered.

9. New England

Boston, the capital of New England, had numerous English attributes. It was described as being defended by a castle and platform of guns.

10. Cheese

The cheese of Ireland was prohibited to be imported into the UK. Parmesan cheese was renowned abroad, especially in France.