"Haven't I a perfect right?" she snapped.
"You certainly have, Miss, and a peach of a left," he replied.
ALLEGRO
"That'sallFergusonI'llringifIwantyouagain."
"YessirthankyousirshallIsayyouareoutifanyonecallssir?"
"TellthemIamoutofthecityandFerguson."
"Yessir?"
"Havetheautoreadyforanearlyruninthemorning.
HavealargebunchoforchidsinthevaseFerguson."
"Yessiranythingelsesir?"
"NothingelseFerguson."
Readeritisonlytheconversationinatalkingmovieshowtryingtokeepupwiththepictures.
JUST ANSWERED
A soldier in the English Army wrote home: "They put me in barracks; they
took away my clothes and put me in khaki; they took away my name and
made me 'No. 575'; they took me to church, where I'd never been before,
and they made me listen to a sermon for forty minutes. Then the parson
said: 'No. 575. Art thou weary, art thou languid?' and I got seven days
in the guardhouse because I answered that I certainly was."
TOO LONG A SHOT
A famous jockey was taken suddenly ill, and the trainer advised him to
visit a doctor in the town.
"He'll put you right in a jiffy," he said.
The same evening he found Benjamin lying curled up in the stables,
kicking his legs about in agony.
"Hello, Benny! Haven't you been to the doctor?"
"Yes."
"Well, didn't he do you any good?"
"I didn't go in. When I got to his house there was a brass plate on his
door - 'Dr. Kurem. Ten to one' - I wasn't going to monkey with a long shot
like that!"
SENSITIVE
Here is a story of a London "nut" who had mounted guard for the first
time:
The colonel had just given him a wigging because of the state of his
equipment. A little later the colonel passed his post. The nut did not
salute. The indignant colonel turned and passed again. The nut ignored
him.
"Why in the qualified blazes don't you salute?" the colonel roared.
"Ah," said the nut, softly, "I fawncied you were vexed with me."
NO USE FOR IT
Pat walked into the post-office. After getting into the telephone-box he
called a wrong number. As there was no such number, the switch-attendant
did not answer him. Pat shouted again, but received no answer.
The lady of the post-office opened the door and told him to shout a
little louder, which he did, but still no answer.
Again she said he would have to speak louder. Pat got angry at this,
and, turning to the lady, said:
"Begorra, if I could shout any louder I wouldn't use your bloomin' ould
telephone at all!"
EFFECTIVE
Some people are always optimists:
"Beanborough," said a friend of that gentleman, "always looks on the
bright side of things."
"Why?"
"Well, the other day I went with him to buy a pair of shoes. He didn't
try them on at the store, and when he got home he found that a nail was
sticking right up through the heel of one."
"Did he take them back?"
"Not much. He said that he supposed the nail was put there intentionally
to keep the foot from sliding forward in the shoe."
GERMAN ARITHMETIC
1 German equals 10 unkultured foreigners.
2 soldiers equal 10 civilians.
3 officers equal 12 privates.
4 treaties equal 8 scraps of paper.
5 poisoned wells equal 1 strategic retreat.
6 iron crosses equal 1 ruined cathedral.
7 Zeppelin raids equal 7 demonstrations of frightfulness.
8 eggs equal 8 hearty meals (common people).
9 eggs equal 1 appetizer (aristocracy).
10 deported Belgians equal 10 unmarked graves.
11 torpedoed neutrals equal 11 disavowals.
12 Gotts equal 1 Kaiser.
A DIFFICULT PASSAGE
"I thought you were preaching, Uncle Bob," said the Colonel, to whom the
elderly Negro had applied for a job.
"Yessah, Ah wuz," replied Uncle; "but Ah guess Ah ain't smaht enough to
expound de Scriptures. Ah almost stahved to deff tryin' to explain de
true meanin' uv de line what says 'De Gospel am free,' Dem fool niggahs
thought dat it meant dat Ah wuzn't to git no salary."
WHERE VERMONT SCORED
A gentleman from Vermont was traveling west in a Pullman when a group of
men from Topeka, Kansas, boarded the train and began to praise their
city to the Vermonter, telling him of the wide streets and beautiful
avenues. Finally the Vermonter became tired and said the only thing that
would improve their city would be to make it a seaport.
The enthusiastic Westerners laughed at him and asked how they could make
it a seaport being so far from the ocean.
The Vermonter replied that it would be a very easy task.
"The only thing that you will have to do," said he, "is to lay a
two-inch pipe from your city to the Gulf of Mexico. Then if you fellows
can suck as hard as you can blow you will have it a seaport inside half
an hour."
DOING UNTO HIS NEIGHBOR
"Hey, kid!" yelled the game warden, appearing suddenly above the young
fisherman. "You are fishing for trout. Don't you know they ain't in
season?"
"Sure," replied the youth, "but when it's the season for trout they
ain't around, and when it ain't the season there's lots of 'em. If the
fish ain't a-goin' to obey the rules, I ain't neither."
THE LIMIT
He was a very small boy. Paddy was his dog, and Paddy was nearer to his
heart than anything on earth. When Paddy met swift and hideous death on
the turnpike road his mother trembled to break the news. But it had to
be, and when he came home from school she told him simply:
"Paddy has been run over and killed."
He took it very quietly; finished his dinner with appetite and spirits
unimpaired. All day it was the same. But five minutes after he had gone
up to bed there echoed through the house a shrill and sudden
lamentation. His mother rushed upstairs with solicitude and sympathy.
"Nurse says," he sobbed, "that Paddy has been run over and killed."
"But, dear, I told you that at dinner, and you didn't seem to trouble at
all."
"No; but - but I didn't know you said Paddy. I - I thought you said
daddy!"
NO TELLING
A rather patronizing individual from town was observing with
considerable interest the operations of a farmer with whom he had put up
for a while.
As he watched the old man sow the seed in his field the man from the
city called out facetiously:
"Well done, old chap. You sow; I reap the fruits."
Whereupon the farmer grinned and replied:
"Maybe you will. I am sowing hemp."
A RECORD BREAKER
Along the Fox River, a few miles above Wedron, Ill., an old-timer named
Andy Haskins has a shack, and he has made most of the record fish
catches in that vicinity during forty years. He has a big record book
containing dates and weights to impress visitors.
Last summer a young married couple from Chicago camped in a luxurious
lodge three miles above old Haskins's place. A baby was born at the
lodge, and the only scales the father could obtain on which to weigh the
child was that with which Andy Haskins had weighed all the big fish he
had caught in ten years.
The baby tipped the scales at thirty-five pounds!
EVIDENCE
Circumstantial evidence is not always conclusive. But certain kinds of
it cannot be disputed. In the following colloquy the policeman appears
to have the best of it.
"Not guilty, sir," replied the prisoner.
"Where did you find the prisoner?" asked the magistrate.
"In Trafalgar Square, sir," was the Bobby's reply.
"And what made you think he was intoxicated?"
"Well, sir, he was throwing his walking-stick into the basin of one of
the fountains and trying to entice one of the stone lions to go and
fetch it out again."
A FUTURE STATESMAN
All the talk of hyphenated citizenship has evidently had its effect upon
a San Francisco youngster, American born, who recently rebelled fiercely
when his Italian father whipped him for some misdemeanor.
"But, Tomaso," said one of the family, "your father has a right to whip
you when you are bad."
Tomaso's eyes flashed. "I am a citizen of the United States," he
declared. "Do you think that I am going to let any foreigner lick me?"
SMARTY!
William Dean Howells, at a dinner in Boston, said of modern American
letters: "The average popular novel shows, on the novelist's part, an
ignorance of his trade, which reminds me of a New England clerk. In a
New England village I entered the main-street department store one
afternoon and said to the clerk at the book counter: 'Let me have,
please, the "Letters of Charles Lamb".' 'Post-office right across the
street, Mr. Lamb,' said the clerk, with a polite, brisk smile"
HOW TO TELL A WELL-BRED DOG
If he defies all the laws of natural beauty and symmetry,
If he has a disease calling for specialists,
If he cannot eat anything but Russian caviar and broiled sweetbreads,
If he costs more than a six-cylinder roadster,
If he must be bathed in rose water and fed out of a cutglass bowl,
If he cannot be touched by the naked hand, or patted more than twice a
day,
If he refuses to wear anything but imported leather collars,
If he has to sleep on a silk cushion.
If he dies before you can get him home.
Then he is a well-bred dog.
TRY IT AND SEE
A few years ago, while watching a parade in Boston in which the Stars
and Stripes were conspicuous, a fair foreigner with strong
anti-American proclivities turned to a companion, and commenting on the
display, pettishly remarked:
"That American flag makes me sick. It looks just like a piece of
checkerberry candy."
Senator Lodge, who was standing near by, overheard the remark, and
turning to the young lady, said:
"Yes, miss, it does. And it makes everyone sick who tries to lick it."
WHAT HE MIGHT HAVE BEEN
Being well equipped physically, Michael Murphy had no difficulty in
holding his job as village sexton, until the first interment, when he
was asked to sign the certificate. "Oi can't write," said Mike, and was
discharged.
Out of a job, Mike turned to contracting and in time became wealthy and
a figure in his community. When he applied to the leading bank for a
loan of fifty thousand dollars, he was assured that he could get it - and
was asked to sign the necessary notes. Again he was obliged to reply:
"Oi can't write."
The banker was astounded. "And you have accumulated all this wealth and
position without knowing how to write!" he exclaimed. "What would you
have been to-day if you could write?"
Mike paused a moment, and answered:
"Oi would have been a sexton."
CONCLUSIVE
Two Irishmen were working on the roof of a building one day when one
made a mis-step and fell to the ground; the other leaned over and
called: "Are ye dead or alive, Mike?"
"I'm alive," said Mike, feebly.
"Sure, yer such a liar I don't know whether to believe ye or not."
"Well, then, I must be dead," said Mike, "for ye would never dare to
call me a liar if I were alive."
WHY NOT?
They were a very saving old couple, and as a result they had a
beautifully furnished house. One day the old woman missed her husband.
"Joseph, where are you?" she called out.
"I'm resting in the parlor," came the reply.
"What, on the sofy?" cried the old woman, horrified.
"No, on the floor."
"Not on that grand carpet!" came in tones of anguish.
"No; I've rolled it up!"
HOW COULD HE KNOW?
The youth seated himself in the dentist's chair. He wore a wonderful
striped shirt and a more wonderful checked suit and had the vacant stare
of "nobody home" that goes with both.
The dentist looked at his assistant. "I am afraid to give him gas," he
said.
"Why?" asked the assistant.
"Well," said the dentist, "how can I tell when he's unconscious?"
IN ADVANCE
In a rural court the old squire had made a ruling so unfair that three
young lawyers at once protested against such a miscarriage of justice.
The squire immediately fined each of the lawyers five dollars for
contempt of court.
There was silence, and then an older lawyer walked slowly to the front
of the room and deposited a ten-dollar bill with the clerk. He then
addressed the judge as follows:
"Your honor, I wish to state that I have twice as much contempt for
this court as any man in the room."
NO FREE ADVERTISING
A violinist was bitterly disappointed with the account of his recital
printed in the paper of a small town.
"I told your man three or four times," complained the musician to the
owner of the paper, "that the instrument I used was a genuine
Stradivarius, and in his story there was not a word about it, not a
word."
Whereupon the owner said with a laugh: "That is as it should be. When
Mr. Stradivarius gets his fiddles advertised in my paper under ten cents
a line, you come around and let me know."
WHY NOT?
Jimmie giggled when the teacher read the story of the man who swam
across the Tiber three times before breakfast.
"You do not doubt that a trained swimmer could do that, do you?"
"No, sir," answered Jimmie, "but I wonder why he did not make it four
and get back to the side where his clothes were."
THE SAME OLD HOURS
She was a widow who was trying to get in touch with her deceased
husband.
The medium, after a good deal of futile work, said to her:
"The conditions this evening seem unfavorable. I can't seem to establish
communication with Mr. Smith, ma'am."
"Well, I'm not surprised," said the widow, with a glance at the clock.
"It's only half-past eight now, and John never did show up till about
three A.M."
WHY NOT?
Private Jones was summoned to appear before his captain.
"Jones," said the officer, frowning darkly, "this gentleman complains
that you have killed his dog."
"A dastardly trick," interrupted the owner of the dog, "to kill a
defenseless animal that would harm no one!"
"Not much defenseless about him," chimed in the private, heatedly. "He
bit pretty freely into my leg, so I ran my bayonet into him."
"Nonsense!" answered the owner angrily. "He was a docile creature. Why
did you not defend yourself with the butt of your rifle?"
"Why didn't he bite me with his tail?" asked Private Jones, with spirit.
FIGURATIVELY SPEAKING
Dr. Harvey Wiley tells the following story: Sleepily, after a night off,
a certain interne hastened to his hospital ward. The first patient was a
stout old Irishman.
"How goes it?" he inquired.
"Faith, it'sh me breathin', doctor. I can't get me breath at all, at
all."
"Why, your pulse is normal. Let me examine the lung-action," replied the
doctor, kneeling beside the cot and laying his head on the ample chest.
"Now, let's hear you talk," he continued, closing his eyes and
listening.
"What'll Oi be sayin', doctor?"
"Oh, say anything. Count one, two, three, and up," murmured the interne,
drowsily.
"Wan, two, three, four, five, six," began the patient. When the young
doctor, with a start, opened his eyes, he was counting huskily: "Tin
hundred an' sixty-nine, tin hundred an' sivinty, tin hundred an'
sivinty-wan."
THE MAN HE LEFT BEHIND
An English storekeeper went to the war and left his clerk behind to look
after things. When he was wounded and taken to the hospital, what was
his surprise to find his clerk in the cot next to him.
"Well, I thought I left you to take care of the store," said the
storekeeper.
"You did," answered the clerk, "But you didn't tell me I had to look
after your women folks as well as the store. I stood it as long as I
could and then I said to myself: 'Look here, if you've got to fight, you
might as well go and fight someone that you can hit.'"
SOME SPEED
It was a dull day in the trenches, and a bunch of Tommies had gathered
and were discussing events. After a while the talk turned on a big Boche
who had been captured the night before.
"He was scared stiff," said one Tommy.
"Did he run?" asked another.
"Run?" replied the first. "Why, if that Boche had had jest one feather
in his hand he'd 'a' flew."
A DEEP-LAID PLAN
"Would you mind letting me off fifteen minutes early after this, sir?"
asked the bookkeeper. "You see, I've moved into the suburbs and I can't
catch my train unless I leave at a quarter before five o'clock."
"I suppose I'll have to," grumbled the boss; "but you should have
thought of that before you moved."
"I did," confided the bookkeeper to the stenographer a little later,
"and that's the reason I moved."
ONLY ONE THING FOR HIM
A three-hundred-pound man stood gazing longingly at the nice things
displayed in a haberdasher's window for a marked-down sale. A friend
stopped to inquire if he was thinking of buying shirts or pyjamas.
"Gosh, no!" replied the fat man wistfully. "The only thing that fits me
ready-made is a handkerchief."
A TEST OF FRIENDSHIP
Andy Foster, a well-known character in his native city, had recently
shuffled off this mortal soil in destitute circumstances, although in
his earlier days he enjoyed financial prosperity.
A prominent merchant, an old friend of the family, attended the funeral
and was visibly affected as he gazed for the last time on his old friend
and associate.
The mourners were conspicuously few in number and some attention was
attracted by the sorrowing merchant. "The old gentleman was very dear to
you?" ventured one of the bearers after the funeral was over.
"Indeed, he was," answered the mourner. "Andy was one true friend. He
never asked me to lend him a cent, though I knew that he was practically
starving to death."
BLISSFUL IGNORANCE
It was during the nerve-racking period of waiting for the signal to go
over the top that a seasoned old sergeant noticed a young soldier fresh
from home visibly affected by the nearness of the coming fight. His face
was pale, his teeth chattering, and his knees tried to touch each other.
It was sheer nervousness, but the sergeant thought it was sheer funk.
"Tompkins," he whispered, "is it trembling you are for your dirty
skin?"
"No, no, sergeant," said he, making a brave attempt to still his limbs.
"I'm trembling for the Germans; they don't know I'm here."
GRATEFUL TO THE DOCTOR
A Chinaman was asked if there were good doctors in China.
"Good doctors!" he exclaimed. "China have best doctors in world. Hang
Chang one good doctor; he great; save life, to me."
"You don't say so! How was that?"
"Me velly bad," he said. "Me callee Doctor Han Kon. Give some medicine.
Get velly, velly ill. Me callee Doctor San Sing. Give more medicine. Me
glow worse - go die. Blimebly callee Doctor Hang Chang. He got no time;
no come. Save life."
HE MIGHT BE, BUT SHE WASN'T
Dinah had been troubled with a toothache for some time before she got up
enough courage to go to a dentist. The moment he touched her tooth she
screamed.
"What are you making such a noise for?" he demanded. "Don't you know
I'm a 'painless dentist'?"
"Well, sah," retorted Dinah, "mebbe yo' is painless, but Ah isn't."
A SPORTING PROPOSITION
An Arkansas man who intended to take up a homestead claim in a
neighboring state sought information in the matter from a friend.
"I don't remember the exact wording of the law," said the latter, "but I
can give ye the meanin' of it all right. It's like this: The government
of the United States is willin' to bet one hundred and sixty acres of
land against fourteen dollars that ye can't live on it five years
without starvin' to death."
THE PROPOSAL
He was a morbid youth and a nervous lover. Often had he wished to tell
the maiden how he longed to make her all his own. Again and again had
his nerve failed him. But to-night there was a "do-or-die" look in his
eye.
They started for their usual walk, and rested awhile upon his favorite
seat - a gravestone in the village churchyard. A happy inspiration
seized him. "Maria," he said in trembling accents - "Maria! When you
die - how should you like to be buried here with my name on the stone
over you?"
KNEW MORE ABOUT HENS THAN HISTORY
After reading the famous poem, "The Landing of the Pilgrim Fathers," to
the class, the teacher said: "As a drawing exercise suppose you each
draw, according to your imagination, a picture of Plymouth Rock."
All but one little fellow set to work. He paused and finally raised his
hand.
"What is it, Edgar?" the teacher asked.
"Please, ma'am," Edgar piped out, "do you want us to draw a hen or a
rooster?"
CHARITY
Bishop Penhurst was talking, in Boston, about charity.
"Some charities," he said, "remind me of the cold, proud, beautiful lady
who, glittering with diamonds, swept forth from a charity ball at dawn,
crossed the frosty sidewalk, and entered her huge limousine.
"A beggar woman whined at the window:
"'Could ye give me a trifle for a cup of coffee, lady?'
"The lady looked at the beggar reproachfully.
"'Good gracious!' she said. 'Here you have the nerve to ask me for money
when I've been tangoing for you the whole night through! Home, James.'
"And she snapped the window shut in the beggar's face indignantly."
ADVICE TO MABEL
A London man just back from the States says that a little girl on the
train to Pittsburgh was chewing gum. Not only that, but she insisted on
pulling it out in long strings and letting it fall back into her mouth
again.
"Mabel!" said her mother in a horrified whisper. "Mabel, don't do that.
Chew your gum like a little lady."
NOT A NATIVE
A New York man took a run not long ago into Connecticut, to a town where
he had lived as a boy.
On his native heath he accosted a venerable old chap of some eighty
years, who proved to be the very person the Gothamite sought to answer
certain inquiries concerning the place. As the conversation proceeded
the New Yorker said:
"I suppose you have always lived around here?"
"No," said the old man, "I was born two good miles from here."
HE GOT IT TWICE
They were twins. It was bathing time and from the twins' bedroom came
sounds of hearty laughter and loud crying. Their father went up to find
the cause.
"What's the matter up here?" he inquired.
The laughing twin pointed to his weeping brother. "Nothing," he giggled,
"only nurse has given Alexander two baths and hasn't given me any at
all."
TOO MUCH
One of the Scottish golf clubs gives a dinner each year to the
youngsters it employs as caddies. At the feast last year one of the boys
disdained to use any of the forks he found at his place, and loaded his
food into himself with his knife. When the ice-cream course was reached
and he still used his knife, a boy who sat opposite to him, and who
could stand it no longer, shouted:
"Great Scot! Look at Skinny, usin' his iron all the way round!"
THE DIGNITIES OF OFFICE
This story - which is perhaps true and perhaps not - is being told in many
Italian messrooms. On one of his royal tours, King Victor Emmanuel spent
the night in a small country town, where the people showed themselves
unusually eager in caring for his comfort. So when he had gone to bed,
he was surprised to be wakened by a servant who wanted to put clean
sheets on his bed. However, he waited good-naturedly while it was done,
and wished the servant good-night. He had dozed off to sleep, when he
was roused for the second time by a rap on the door; and the servant
reappeared, asking to change the sheets again.
Naturally, the King asked why the change was made so often. The servant
answered reverently, "For oneself, one changes the sheets every week;
for an honored friend, every day; but for a king, every hour."
FAME
A Long Island teacher was recounting the story of Red Riding Hood. After
describing the woods and the wild animals that flourished therein, she
added:
"Suddenly Red Riding Hood heard a great noise. She turned about, and
what do you suppose she saw standing there, gazing at her and showing
all its sharp, white teeth?"
"Teddy Roosevelt!" volunteered one of the boys.
NO PEACE FOR HIM
Willie was out walking with his mother, when she thought she saw a boy
on the other side of the street making faces at her darling.
"Willie," asked mother, "is that horrid boy making faces at you?"
"He is," replied Willie, giving his coat a tug. "Now, mother, don't
start any peace talk - you just hold my coat for about five minutes."
BOILED
Not long ago the editor of an English paper ordered a story of a certain
length, but when the story arrived he discovered that the author had
written several hundred words too many.
The paper was already late in going to press so there was no
alternative - the story must be condensed to fit the allotted space.
Therefore the last few paragraphs were cut down to a single sentence. It
read thus:
"The Earl took a Scotch high-ball, his hat, his departure, no notice of
his pursuers, a revolver out of his hip pocket, and finally, his life."
FORCED INTO IT
Even the excessive politeness of some men may be explained on purely
practical grounds. Of a certain suburbanite, a friend said:
"I heard him speaking most beautifully of his wife to another lady on
the train just now. Rather unusual in a man these days."
"Not under the circumstances," said the other man. "That was a new cook
he was escorting out."
HOODOOED
Appealing to a lady for aid, an old darky told her that through the
Dayton flood he had lost everything he had in the world, including his
wife and six children.
"Why," said the lady, "I have seen you before and I have helped you.
Were you not the colored man who told me you had lost your wife and six
children by the sinking of the _Titanic_?"
"Yeth, ma'am, dat wuz me. Mos' unfort'nit man dat eber wuz. Kain't keep
a fam'ly nohow."
SAFE DEPOSIT
An old lady, who was sitting on the porch of a hotel at Asheville, North
Carolina, where also there were a number of youngsters, was approached
by one of them with this query:
"Can you crack nuts?"
The old lady smiled and said: "No, my dear, I can't. I lost all my teeth
years ago."
"Then," said the boy, extending two hands full of walnuts, "please hold
these while I go and get some more."
THE MATTER WITH KANSAS
Governor Capper, of Kansas, recently pointed out what he deemed to be
the "matter with Kansas." The average Kansan, he said, gets up in the
morning in a house made in Michigan, at the sound of an alarm clock made
in Illinois; puts on his Missouri overalls; washes his hands with
Cincinnati soap in a Pennsylvania basin; sits down to a Grand Rapids
table; eats Battle Creek breakfast food and Chicago bacon cooked on a
Michigan range; puts New York harness on a span of Missouri mules and
hitches them to a South Bend wagon, or starts up his Illinois tractor
with a Moline plow attached. After the day's work he rides down town in
a Detroit automobile, buys a box of St. Louis candy for his wife, and
spins back home, where he listens to music "canned" in New Jersey.
THE BETTER WAY
Charles M. Schwab, congratulated in Pittsburgh on a large war order
contract which he had just received from one of the warring nations,
said:
"Some people call it luck, but they are mistaken. Whatever success I
have is due to hard work and not to luck.
"I remember a New York business man who crossed the ocean with me one
winter when the whole country was suffering from hard times.
"'And you. Mr. Schwab,' the New Yorker said, 'are, like the rest of us,
I suppose, hoping for better things?'
"'No, my friend,' I replied. 'No, I am not hoping for better things.
I've got my sleeves rolled up and I'm working for them.'"
A HORSE PSYCHOLOGIST
Twice as the horse-bus slowly wended its way up the steep hill the door
at the rear opened and slammed. At first those inside paid little heed,
but the third time they demanded to know why they should be disturbed in
this fashion.
"Whist!" cautioned the driver. "Don't spake so loud. He'll overhear us."
"Who?"
"The hoss. Spake low. Shure Oo'm desavin' the crayture. Every toime he
'ears th' door close he thinks wan o' yez is gettin' down ter walk up
th' hill, an' that sort o' raises 'is sperrits."
STILL NOT SATISFIED
Mrs. Higgins was an incurable grumbler. She grumbled at everything and
everyone. But at last the vicar thought he had found something about
which she could make no complaint; the old lady's crop of potatoes was
certainly the finest for miles round.
"Ah, for once you must be well pleased," he said, with a beaming smile,
as he met her in the village street. "Everyone's saying how splendid
your potatoes are this year."
The old lady glowered at him as she answered:
"They're not so poor. But where's the bad ones for the pigs?"
A COAXER
The latest American church device for "raising the wind" is what a
religious paper describes as "some collection-box." The inventor hails
from Oklahoma. If a member of the congregation drops in a twenty-five
cent piece or a coin of larger value, there is silence. If it is a
ten-cent piece a bell rings, a five-cent piece sounds a whistle, and a
cent fires a blank cartridge. If any one pretends to be asleep when the
box passes, it awakens him with a watchman's rattle, and a kodak takes
his portrait.
AUTOMATIC "EFFICIENCY"
A young lady telephone operator recently attended a watch-night service
and fell asleep during the sermon. At the close the preacher said, "We
will now sing hymn number three forty-one - three forty-one."
The young lady, just waking in time to hear the number, yawned and said,
"The line is busy."
THE WINNER
While Chopin probably did not time his "Minute Waltz" to exactly sixty
seconds, some auditors insist that it lives up to its name. Mme.
Theodora Surkow-Ryder on one of her tours played the "Minute Waltz" as
an encore, first telling her audience what it was. Thereupon a huge man
in a large riding suit took out an immense silver watch, held it open
almost under her nose, and gravely proceeded to time her. The pianist's
fingers flew along the keys, and her anxiety was rewarded when the man
closed the watch with a loud slap and said in a booming voice: "Gosh!
She's done it."
TAXED TO CAPACITY
A friendly American who has just arrived in London brings a story of
Edison. The great inventor was present at a dinner in New York to which
Count Bernstorff had also found his way. The Count spoke of the number
of new ships which Germany had built since the war began. He was
listened to respectfully enough, although a little coldly, because the
sympathies of the party were not with him or Germany.
When he had stopped, Edison looked up and said in a still, small voice,
and with a serious face:
"Must not the Kiel Canal be very crowded, your Excellency?"
GASTRONOMICAL
A man and a woman entered a café.
"Do you want oysters, Louise?" asked the man, as he glanced over the
bill of fare.
"Yes, George," answered the woman, "and I want a hassock, too."
George nodded, and as he handed the waiter his written order, he said:
"Bring a hassock for the lady."
"Yes, sir," answered the waiter, "one hassock."
A moment later the waiter, apparently puzzled, approached the man, and
leaning over him, said:
"Excuse me, sir, but I have only been here two days and do not want to
make any mistakes. Will the lady have the hassock broiled or fried?"
A LITERAL CENSOR
Joe T. Marshall, formerly of Kansas, recently became the father of an
eight-pound boy, and wished to cable the news to his family in America.
The censor refused to allow the message to go through.
"What's the matter?" Marshall asked indignantly.
"We aren't permitted to announce the arrival of Americans in France!"
UP TO HIM
David Belasco was smiling at the extravagant attentions that are
lavished by the rich upon pet dogs. He spoke of the canine operations
for appendicitis, the canine tooth crownings, the canine wardrobes, and
then he said:
"How servants hate these pampered curs! At a house where I was calling
one cold day the fat and pompous butler entered the drawing-room and
said:
"'Did you ring, madam?'
"'Yes, Harrison, I wish you to take Fido out walking for two hours.'
"Harrison frowned slightly. 'But Fido won't follow me, madam,' he said.
"'Then, Harrison, you must follow Fido.'"
NOT IN THE TACTICS
A company of very new soldiers were out on a wide heath, practising the
art of taking cover. The officer in charge of them turned to one of the
rawest of his men.
"Get down behind that hillock there," he ordered, sternly, "and mind,
not a move or a sound!"
A few minutes later he looked around to see if they were all concealed,
and, to his despair, observed something wriggling behind the small
mound. Even as he watched the movements became more frantic.
"I say, you there!" he shouted, angrily, "do you know you are giving our
position away to the enemy?"
"Yes, sir," said the recruit, in a voice of cool desperation, "and do
you know that this is an anthill?"
A GUILTY CONSCIENCE
A young fellow who was the crack sprinter of his town - somewhere in the
South - was unfortunate enough to have a very dilatory laundress. One
evening, when he was out for a practice run in his rather airy and
abbreviated track costume, he chanced to dash past the house of that
dusky lady, who at the time was a couple of weeks in arrears with his
washing.
He had scarcely reached home again when the bell rang furiously and an
excited voice was wafted in from the porch:
"Foh de Lawd's sake! won't you-all tell Marse Bob please not to go out
no moh till I kin git his clo'es round to him?'"
MAKING IT FIT
"Did you hear about the defacement of Mr. Skinner's tombstone?" asked
Mr. Brown a few days after the funeral of that eminent captain of
industry.
"No, what was it?" inquired his neighbor curiously.
"Someone added the word 'friends' to the epitaph."
"What was the epitaph?"
"'He did his best.'"
A LESSON IN MANNERS
This is the way the agent got a lesson in manners. He called at a
business office, and saw nobody but a prepossessing though
capable-appearing young woman.
"Where's the boss?" he asked abruptly.
"What is your business?" she asked politely.
"None of yours!" he snapped. "I got a proposition to lay before this
firm, and I want to talk to somebody about it."
"And you would rather talk to a gentleman?"
"Yes."
"Well," answered the lady, smiling sweetly, "so would I. But it seems
that it's impossible for either one of us to have our wish, so we'll
have to make the best of it. State your business, please!"
AN UNFORTUNATE AFFAIR
"Look here," yelled the infuriated bridegroom of a day, dashing wildly
into the editor's room of the country weekly; "what do you mean by such
an infernal libel on me in your account of our wedding?"
"What's the matter?" asked the editor calmly. "Didn't we say that after
your wedding tour you would make your home at the Old Manse?"
"Yes," howled the newly made benedict, "and just see how you've spelled
it."
And the editor looked and read:
After their wedding tour the newly married couple will
make their home at the Old Man's.
CURIOSITY
"Children," said the Sunday-school superintendent, "this picture
illustrates to-day's lesson: Lot was warned to take his wife and
daughters and flee out of Sodom. Here are Lot and his daughters, with
his wife just behind them; and there is Sodom in the background. Now,
has any girl or boy a question before we take up the study of the
lesson? Well, Susie?"
"Pleathe, thir," lisped the latest graduate from the infant class,
"where ith the flea?"
THE SIMPLE POLITICAL LIFE
The American characteristic which demands ornaments and "fixin's" to all
ceremonies, as contrasted with genuine simplicity, is thus scored by
Judge Pettingill of Chanute:
"My ambition in life," said the Judge, "is to be the organizer of a
lodge without flub-dub, gold tassel uniforms, red tape ritual, a
regiment of officers with high-sounding titles, a calisthenic drill of
idiotic signs and grips, a goat, and members who call each other
'brother.' I would name the presiding officer 'it,' and its first by-law
would provide for the expulsion of the member who advocated the wearing
of a lodge pin."
PIGTAILS AND MOUSTACHES
When Wu Ting Fang was Minister to the United States from China, he
visited Chicago. A native of the Windy City said to him at a reception:
"Mr. Wu, I see there is a movement in China to abolish the pigtails you
wear. Why do you wear the foolish thing, anyhow?"
"Well," countered Mr. Wu, "why do you wear your foolish moustache?"
"Oh, that's different," said the Chicago man; "you see I've got an
impossible mouth."
"So I should suppose," retorted Mr. Wu, "judging from some of your
remarks."
HIS SEARCH FOR THE PRACTICAL
"Now," it was explained to Aladdin, "this is a wonderful lamp. Rub it
and a genie appears."
"I see little to that," he replied. "What I want is a lamp that won't go
out on my automobile and get me pinched by a traffic cop."
HARD UP FOR WIND
Everything in the dear old village seemed the same to Jones after his
absence of four years. The old church, the village pump, the ducks on
the green, the old men smoking while their wives gossip - it was so
restful after the rush and bustle of the city. Suddenly he missed
something.
"Where's Hodge's windmill?" he asked in surprise. "I can only see one
mill, and there used to be two."
The native gazed thoughtfully round, as if to verify the statement. Then
he said slowly:
"They pulled one down. There weren't enough wind for two on'em!"
HE KNEW BRYAN
At a recent political convention two of the delegates were discussing
the religious affiliations of prominent statesmen, when one of them, a
Baptist, observed to the other, who was a Methodist:
"I understand that William Jennings Bryan has turned Baptist."
"What?" exclaimed the Methodist. "Why, that can't be!"
"Yes, it is," persisted the Baptist.
"No, sir," continued the Methodist; "it can't be true. To become a
Baptist one must be entirely immersed."
"Yes, that is very true; but what has that to do with it?"
"Simply this," returned the Methodist: "Mr. Bryan would never consent to
disappear from public view as long as that."
HIS NEED
John Hendricks, a singular Western character, awoke one morning to find
himself wealthy through a rich mining strike. Soon he concluded to
broaden his mind by travel, and decided to go to Europe Boarding the
ship, he singled out the captain and said: "Captain, if I understand the
way this here ship is constructed it's got several water-tight
compartments?"
"Yes, sir."
"Water's all on the outside - can't none get in nohow?"
"No, sir."
"Captain," said Hendricks, decidedly, "I want one o' them
compartments - I don't care what it costs extry."
ALL OR NOTHING
Senator Jim Nye of Nebraska tells this story to illustrate some of the
evils of prohibition. The Senator said, apropos of his visit to a "dry"
town.
"After a long speech and then talking to all the magnates of the
neighborhood, I went to bed dry as a powder horn. I could not sleep and
as soon as it was daylight I went down into the dining room: As I sat
there the mistress of the house came in and said 'Senator, you are up
early.' I said: 'Yes, living in the West so long, I am afflicted with
malaria, and I could not sleep.' She went over to a tea caddy, took out
a bottle and said: 'Senator, this is a prohibition town, you know, but
we have malaria and we find this a good antidote. I know it will do you
good.'"
The Senator seized the bottle with avidity and thankfulness. He settled