Chapter LXX: Josh Epistolates

_Neptune._--I cant answer yure questions satisfactorily tew miself, but perhaps mi answers may suit yu. I cant tell yu what _wit_ and _humor_ is.

It may be the bringing together two ideas, apparently unlike, and hav them prove tew be a cluss match.

Thare wouldn't be enny wit in striking fire with a flint, but thare might be in striking fire with a piece of injia rubber.

I don't serpose thare would be enny grate quantity ov wit in yure telling sumboddy that yure gal was as hansum as a rose, but thare might possibly be sum wit into it if yu should go on and say that she was as frail, and as thorny, too.

Humor (as compared with wit) seems to be what the old fashioned folks in Connecticut used tew call "heat lightning," not the original artikle that gashes the heavens with a flaming sword, and makes a fellow's hair get up on end and ake with astonishment. Humor don't dazzle, don't knock a man down with a sparkle; it is more a soothing syrup, sumthing tew tickle, without enny danger ov throwing the patient into fits.

Thare seems tew be more than one kind ov wit; punning is called wit, but punning alwus looked to me like trieing tew make words pass for ideas.

Thare is without doubt, sum wit in puns, but it is something like sticking a pin into a man, just for fun, and then ask him tew join in the joke.

Thare is sum more kinds ov wit, but i find i aint roomy enuff in the skull tew talk mutch about them.

Wit and humor both are similar tew kissing; thare is a peculiar kind ov bewitchment in awl three ov them, that evryboddy can acknowledge better than they can pictur out.

Almost evryboddy hankers tew be witty, and most folks think they am, but ginowine wit is like piety; thare aint much ov it in the market, and those who think they hav the least ov it, are quite apt tew hav the most.

_Philo._--I am chuck full ov favourable sentiments towards dancing. I like most awl kinds, from a genteel, and modest Saratoger prance, tew the limber, and loose bilt Alabama break-down. Thare is no other way tew git the booby out ov a boy, and keep him from steping onto himself, than tew learn him how tew danse. This kind ov leg manuel is useful for both sexes. Dancing is just as harmless as gitting over a fence, and i think dancing-masters should be encouraged, but still i haint got enny more respekt for a full grown man, who weighs over a hundred pounds, who will give himself up tew this profession, ov learning folks how tew dance, than I hav for the fellow who exhibits trained mice. The best apology that i kan make, tew these dancing professors, is tew say, that they are martyrs tew the calling. But while I am loud in mi sentiments for the theory ov motion, thare is sum ov its collaterals that don't fasten onto my bussum with mutch exta-tickness, but rather with grate clammyness. I don't kno but awl the kind ov dances that are now raging, are as free from guile as an oyster, but i hav witnessed sum amung the top ov the ladder folks, (i don't know the name ov the dances) that i think ought tew be confined tew the married people, and each man with his own wife, and not tew menny bystanders at that.

The amusements which i refer to, are ov the cluss communion style, a species ov affectionate rotaryousness, interspersed with palpitating pauses, and demiquaver wiglings, which, strike me, must be indulged in with great risk by those whose minds and hearts ain't thoroughly broke to go in aul harness.

I kant dance miself; i was away from hum in mi younger dase, bissy about sumthing else, when i ought tew hav learnt, and the consequents is, that i cant even walk now without betraying mi awkwardness.

I am most certainly in favor ov dancing, as a matter of boddy and limb educashun; but i hope the fastidious and immoderately polite won't introduce into the exercise ov this most delightful and innocent amusement enny more questionable figgers and forms, and will see the propriety ov banishing some now already indulged in, which are more a credit tew their dexterity and prurient knowledge than tew enny thing else.

_Plutark._--"Bring up a child in the way he should go, and when he gits old, he won't depart from it."

This is trew, but it is tuff to know how to do it.

I have seen children brought up on hasty pudding and the catechism, half and half; but they didn't stick. Ministers' sons are proverbial eggs for badness; this may be owing tew the fact, that religious discipline aint half so good tew raise young ones on as good common sense is.

When I speak ov "religious discipline," Plutark, i don't mean piety, i only mean a certain kind of stiff-faced and buckram morality, made up out ov creed and ironclad noshons.

As a general thing ministers hav as little tew brag ov, over and above their piety, as ennybody i kno ov.

As a class, they are better judges of chicken pie than they are of human natur; their theorys are too much like a tredmill, and there is nothing in the world will ruin a child enny faster than tew bring them up by rule.

Children want studdying as much as the weather dus during planting time, tew know when and what tew plant.

One child may be as easy tew raise as pertatoes, and the next one as difficult as wild oats.

I have raised two miself, and consider them a fair average, and the only string I fiddled on was their good sense, and the more sense a child has got the less fiddling is necessary.

If a young one haint got enny sense, they won't pay for raising ennyhow.

If a child has got plenty ov sense, they are apt tew hav pride, and a child that has got sense and pride, is just as easy tew raise as a hopvine; aul you want to dew is tew stick up a decent pole for them, and then stand one side and look on, and jerusalem! how the critters will climb.