Yes, Irmintrude, There is a Boogyman

We take pleasure in answering thus prominently the communication below, expressing at the same time our great gratification that its faithful author is numbered among the friends of The Great Dark Horde:

Dear Editor---

I am 8 years old. Some of my little friends say there is no Boogyman. Papa says, "If you see it in The Gobi Globe, it's so." Please tell me the truth, is there a Boogyman?

Irmintrude

Irmintrude, your little friends are wrong. They have been affected by the skepticism of a skeptical age. They do not believe except they see. They think that nothing can be which is not comprehensible by their little minds. All minds, Irmintrude, whether they be Kingdomer's or not, are little. In this great universe of ours, man is a mere insect, an ant, in his intellect as compared with the boundless world about him, as measured by the intelligence capable of grasping the whole of truth and knowledge.

Yes, Irmintrude, there is a Boogyman. He exists as certainly as honor and chivalry and courtesy exist, and you know that they abound and give to your life its highest beauty and joy. Alas! how dreary would be the world if there were no Boogyman! It would be as dreary as if there were no Irmintrudes. There would be no childlike faith then, no satire, no lampoons to make the SCA tolerable. We should have no recourse from the rude; no relief from the boring. The external light with which childhood fills the world would be extinguished.

Not believe in the Boogyman! You might as well not believe in fairies. Your Crown might hire men to watch in all the camps at Pennsic to catch the Boogyman, but even if you did not see the Boogyman coming, what would that prove? Nobody sees the Boogyman, but that is no sign that there is no Boogyman. The most real things in the world are those that neither children nor men can see. Did you ever see fairies dancing on the lawn? Of course not, but that's no proof that they are not there. Nobody can conceive or imagine all the wonders there are unseen and unseeable in the world ...... and though you cannot see the Boogyman, you will know when he has been at work.

When you look into the dark corners, or just outside the bounds of the campfire's light, you will see him out of the corner of your eye. He is standing quietly beside the marshall, and looking over the Crown's shoulder. He sits in the Peer's Circle, and sings beside the fire. He is everywhere.

You tear apart the baby's rattle and see what makes the noise inside, but there is a Brotherhood which not the strongest man, nor even the united strength of all the strongest men that ever lived could tear apart. Only faith, poetry, love, romance, loyalty and chivalry compose that Brotherhood. Is it all real? Ah, Irmintrude, in all this world there is nothing else more real and abiding.

No Boogyman? Thank God, he lives and lives forever. A thousand years from now, Irmintrude, nay 10 times 10,000 Pennsics from now, he will continue to make uncomfortable the rude and thoughtless, the power-mad and stupid, for he is a MONGOL and TOMORROW IS HIS.

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