Stupid? Maybe stupid?

Joe Shoemaker
Lambertville
    The sun never sets on the British Empire (1939). This belief was surely helped during the days of Queen Elizabeth I. She sent her courtiers out to get stuff.
   The queen’s favorite getter, then, was Sir Walter Raleigh (1584). Sir Walter has been accused and cursed for being “such a stupid get.”
   A further evaluation of what Sir Walter got would reveal, however, he was “such a meaningless get.”
   The stuff Sir Walter brought back from his exploits of the new world had already been gotten by others before him — those gets being potatoes and tobacco.
   Most people know the effects tobacco have on the human body. Nutritionists are still collecting data on potatoes. In the end, Sir Walter’s run-in with King James I proved his fate.
   Sir Walter’s last words were said to have been: “Strike, man, strike.”
   Stupid? Maybe stupid?
   This little story is about an excerpt from a song, “I’m so tired,” by John Lennon, in which Mr. Lennon blames Sir Walter Raleigh for bringing tobacco to England back in the days of Queen Elizabeth I — when in reality, somebody else brought tobacco to England before him. The rest is a little bit about the ultimate fate of Sir Walter. His head was severed at the direction of King James I.