ABC Wednesday—P is for "pelican"

O, a wondrous bird is the pelican!
His bill holds more than his belican.
He can take in his beak
Enough food for a week.
But I'm damned if I see how the helican.
—Dixon Lanier Merritt, The Pelican [1910]

I've seen this clever limerick attributed to Ogden Nash
and also to Edward Lear. But credit where it's due:
Merritt was a newspaperman, poet, and humorist
(and if Bartlett's says he wrote it . . . case closed).

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