Lost Porls Part I

Ok, so… from time to time, the odd Porl might somehow be… “unaccounted” for, and spend a little bit of time hanging out in one of my books o’ crap, a coat pocket or a letter rack, but that doesn’t mean we value them any less. In fact, I am most delighted when I stumble across them a year or two later. And now you can be too! I am delighted to present, for the first time ever into the light of blog, the *Lost Porls*. Let’s start with this delightful fellow:

This is a simply adorable chap in a delicious Friesian flavour. Let’s not go into the mechanics of it, but even this cross-species curiosity is not the strangest incarnation of Porl we’ll be featuring here today. For example:

Now this, I love. I think it might well be the first and only instance in which Porl has a horse’s body and a lizard’s head to the extent that he is in fact a chap in possession of a horse’s body and a lizard’s head. A possible explanation is offered: Perhaps he is a scientist? Perhaps. Perhaps he is the increasingly desperate purveyor of a failing ventriloquism puppet double-act who has resorted to mishmashing anything he can get his hands on into a semi-operational soubrette capable of both complex emoting and slapstick solely by the means of hand-control in an attempt to regain his once great following as The Legend of the South Creek Sideshow, where for threepence you’d get unlimited rides on the jig-a-ma-round and a peep at the bearded lady before elbowing your way to the front of Porl’s Grotto to be amazed by the realistic and hilarious stylings of his puppet antics. But really, it could be anything – comments are open for suggestions below. Moving swiftly on,

The goings-on here are far more peaceful. This pleasant Porl of the two-legged variety has nothing to fear from the deranged ventriloquist sort, he’s got just the stocky build and stiff upper lip that will see him fend off any form of assault at the hands of a puppeteer without having even to raise an immaculate eyebrow. There is nothing to fear here, ladies and gentlemen, let us then proceed:

A terrible horse? I’d say more just slightly unreasonable, going by his crossed arms – stubborn, maybe. He does though have the air of one perturbed, perhaps he has just lost a slanging match and is now forced to resort to the hunched stance and sticking-out-of-the-tongue, which is just the sort of insolence-up-with-which-we-shall-not-put. On to the next:

There’s a lot happening at once with this Porl: he himself seems to be engaged in a little chomping of dried herbs hung from the kitchen rafters in a Regency home, which he does with a noticable degree of angst. It could be because someone has struck him very hard on the croup wearing a striped Cath Kidston oven glove, leaving him thus imprinted. Or it could be the small bit of tree that has implanted itself just behind his eye there. Or perhaps his microchip collar is playing up, applying unwarranted electric shock therapy all day, every day, resulting in this jittery character of the spindly legs. And is that a 5 o’clock shadow? The state of him! Let us move on so that we can now come full circle to this reverse-Friesian variety:

Here is a smart beast with ample neck and an expression of great purpose. A fine Porl, ladies and gentlmen: take note. And thus our little tour is concluded. Thank you for coming, please take a flyer on the way out.

Moral of the tale: If you’ve drawn a Porl but it’s not in the book, the Facebook group, or here, you might be one of those lucky folk who gets a second attempt at drawing Porl! Oh ho!

And yes, of course I’m very sorry I have mislaid your drawing. It won’t happen again.

Artists: Irene, Austin, Jamie (a “Devonshire lad in Oxford”), Eoin, Kieran and James. All c. 2008