Editing 959: Caroling

{{comic
| number    = 959
| date      = October 3, 2011
| title     = Caroling
| image     = caroling.png
| titletext = For a thousand generations we vowed never to forget how his soldiers feasted on our brother Stephen.
}}

==Explanation==
Here are the lyrics for the first verse of the Christmas Carol, "{{w|Good King Wenceslas}}"

:''Good King Wenceslas looked out, on the Feast of Stephen,''
:''When the snow lay round about, deep and crisp and even;''
:''Brightly shone the moon that night, tho' the frost was cruel,''
:''When a poor man came in sight, gath'ring winter fuel.''

While not a king, {{w|Wenceslaus I, Duke of Bohemia}} is considered a martyr and a saint. Far from being responsible for any massacre, he protected his subjects from external dominance, and is still a national hero to the Czech people. [[Black Hat]] is supplying {{w|disinformation}} to unsuspecting carolers, either to shut them up or just because he's a [[classhole]] like that.

The title text references "the {{w|St. Stephen's Day|Feast of Stephen}}" which is also known as the "Feast of St. Stephen" or "St. Stephen's Day", which is a holiday celebrated on 26 or 27 December, depending on the Western or Eastern church respectively. It is not actually a feast that involved eating a person named Stephen, instead a celebration of the Saint named Stephen.

If you look closely, you can see that the carolers may be a family. The man and woman are confused by what Black Hat has said, and the girl is looking to the adults, perhaps gauging their facial reactions, or just waiting for their reply.

Unusually for Randall, he appears to have made a significant mathematical error in the title text. Wenceslas ruled Bohemia from 921 to 935, so approximately 1100 years ago. This corresponds to, at most, only 44 25-year generations available to have cursed his name, not a thousand.

==Transcript==
:[Three people, two the same size, one smaller stand together singing Christmas carols.]
:Carolers (in unison): Good king Wenceslas looked out on the— 

:[Black Hat leans out of an above ground window.]
:Black Hat: King Wenceslas massacred my people.

:[The carolers stand in silence, the smaller one looks at the others.]

{{comic discussion}}
[[Category:Comics featuring Black Hat]]
[[Category:Music]]
[[Category:Christmas]]