Seven Seas

A plausible piece of prose incorporating the following words:

century, carnage, cordial, censure, cataract, clerical and celery

The vicar deemed it meet to mark the occasion of St Mark’s 100th anniversary by inviting the corpus of the church to celebrate the opening of a new century with thanksgiving.

Accordingly Tobias, the long-serving secretary, was asked to copy an announcement in the forthcoming newsletter. Being almost a centenarian himself after living on a diet of fruit cordial and celery, Tobias considered it a privilege and readily agreed.

The resultant announcement, instead of suggesting a service of homage, seemed to be more like a summons to carnage. The error deserved the Almighty’s wrath but, being excused by advancing years and advancing cataract clouding his eyesight, Tobias was spared serious censure. It was, after all, a forgivable clerical error to mistake inviting the ‘corpus of the church to celebrate the opening of a new century’ for ‘corpses of the church to celebrate the opening of a new cemetery’.