Apart from misplaced modifiers and headlinese, journalism contributes a wide variety of comic ambiguities in both editorial and advertising matter.

A weekly newspaper reported a local romance: ``and the couple were married last Saturday, thus ending a friendship which began in their schooldays.''

An item in the letters column of a newspaper renewed a subscription, adding: ``I personally enjoy your newspaper as much as my husband.''

Then there was the caterer's ad which read: ``Are you getting married or having an affair? We have complete facilities to accommodate 200 people.''

The newspaper too is the favorite habitat of the anatomical. This slip is so-called because its semi ambiguous English always seems to refer to a person's anatomy but never quite means what it seems to say. Samples: He walked in upon her invitation. She kissed him passionately upon his reappearance. He kissed her back.

Not without good reason has the anatomical been called jocular journalese. In news items a man is less often shot in the body or head than in the suburbs. ``While Henry Morgan was escorting Miss Vera Green from the church social last Saturday night, a savage dog attacked them and bit Mr. Morgan on the public square.''

Such items recall the California journalist who reported an accident involving a movie star: ``The area in which Miss N -- was injured is spectacularly scenic.''

The double meaning in the anatomical made it a familiar vaudeville device, as in the gags of Weber and Fields. When a witness at court was asked if he had been kicked in the ensuing rumpus, he replied, ``No, it was in the stomach.'' Strangely enough, this always brought the house down.