Chapter X: Part 10

"They are, indeed," replied Nat.

"You see, I am very fond of that flower," continued the friend. "In fact, I might say it is my favorite. You know, Nat, I married an American beauty."

"Well," said Nat dryly, "you haven't got anything on me. I married a cluster."

"Are you quite sure that was a marriage license you gave me last month?"

"Of course! What's the matter?"

"Well, I thought there might be some mistake, seeing that I've lived a dog's life ever since."

Is not marriage an open question, when it is alleged, from the beginning of the world, that such as are in the institution wish to get out, and such as are out wish to get in.--_Emerson_.

HOUSEHOLDER--"Here, drop that coat and clear out!"

BURGLAR--"You be quiet, or I'll wake your wife and give her this letter I found in your pocket."

The reason why so few marriages are happy is because young ladies spend their time in making nets, not in making cages.--_Swift_.

_See also_ Church discipline; Domestic finance; Trouble.

MARRIAGE FEES

A poor couple who went to the priest to be wedded were met with a demand for the marriage fee. It was not forth-coming. Both the consenting parties were rich in love and in their prospects, but destitute of financial resources. The father was obdurate. "No money, no marriage."

"Give me l'ave, your riverence," said the blushing bride, "to go and get the money."

It was given, and she sped forth on the delicate mission of raising a marriage fee out of pure nothing. After a short interval she returned with the sum of money, and the ceremony was completed to the satisfaction of all. When the parting was taking place the newly-made wife seemed a little uneasy.

"Anything on your mind, Catherine?" said the father.

"Well, your riverence, I would like to know if this marriage could not be spoiled now."

"Certainly not, Catherine. No man can put you asunder."

"Could you not do it yourself, father? Could you not spoil the marriage?"

"No, no, Catherine. You are past me now. I have nothing more to do with your marriage."

"That aises me mind," said Catherine, "and God bless your riverence. There's the ticket for your hat. I picked it up in the lobby and pawned it."

MANDY--"What foh yo' been goin'to de post-office so reg'lar? Are yo' corresponding wif some other female?"

RASTUS--"Nope; but since ah been a-readin' in de papers 'bout dese 'conscience funds' ah kind of thought ah might possibly git a lettah from dat ministah what married us."--_Life_.

The knot was tied; the pair were wed,
And then the smiling bridegroom said
Unto the preacher, "Shall I pay
To you the usual fee today.
Or would you have me wait a year
And give you then a hundred clear,
If I should find the marriage state
As happy as I estimate?"
The preacher lost no time in thought,
To his reply no study brought,
There were no wrinkles on his brow:
Said he, "I'll take three dollars now."

MATHEMATICS

_See_ Arithmetic.

MATRIMONY

_See_ Marriage.

MEASURING INSTRUMENTS

"Golly, but I's tired!" exclaimed a tall and thin negro, meeting a short and stout friend on Washington Street.

"What you been doin' to get tired?" demanded the other.

"Well," explained the thin one, drawing a deep breath, "over to Brother Smith's dey are measurin' de house for some new carpets. Dey haven't got no yawdstick, and I's just ezactly six feet tall. So to oblige Brother Smith, I's been a-layin' down and a-gettin' up all over deir house."

MEDICAL INSPECTION OF SCHOOLS

PASSER-BY--"What's the fuss in the schoolyard, boy?"

THE BOY--"Why, the doctor has just been around examinin' us an' one of the deficient boys is knockin' th' everlastin' stuffin's out of a perfect kid."

MEDICINE

The farmer's mule had just balked in the road when the country doctor came by. The farmer asked the physician if he could give him something to start the mule. The doctor said he could, and, reaching down into his medicine case, gave the animal some powders. The mule switched his tail, tossed his head and started on a mad gallop down the road. The farmer looked first at the flying animal and then at the doctor.

"How much did that medicine cost, Doc?" he asked.

"Oh, about fifteen cents," said the physician.

"Well, give me a quarter's worth, quick!" And he swallowed it. "I've got to catch that mule."

"I hope you are following my instructions carefully, Sandy--the pills three times a day and a drop of whisky at bedtime."

"Weeel, sir, I may be a wee bit behind wi' the pills, but I'm about six weeks in front wi' the whusky."

Rarely has a double meaning turned with more deadly effect upon an innocent perpetrator than in an advertisement lately appearing in a western newspaper. He wrote: "Wanted--a gentleman to undertake the sale of a patent medicine. The advertiser guarantees it will be profitable to the undertaker."

I firmly believe that if the whole _materia medico_ could be sunk to the bottom of the sea, it would be all the better for mankind and all the worse for the fishes.--_O.W. Holmes_.

A man's own observation, what he finds good of, and what he finds hurt of, is the best physic to preserve health.--_Bacon_.

MEEKNESS

One evening just before dinner a wife, who had been playing bridge all the afternoon, came in to find her husband and a strange man (afterward ascertained to be a lawyer) engaged in some mysterious business over the library table, upon which were spread several sheets of paper.

"What are you going to do with all that paper, Henry?" demanded the wife.

"I am making a wish," meekly responded the husband.

"A wish?"

"Yes, my dear. In your presence I shall not presume to call it a will."

MEMORIALS

Two negroes were talking about a recent funeral of a member of their race, at which funeral there had been a profusion of floral tributes. Said the cook:

"Dat's all very well, Mandy; but when I dies I don't want no flowers on my grave. Jes' plant a good old watermelon-vine; an' when she gits ripe, you come dar, an' don't you eat it, but jes' bus' it on de grave, an' let de good old juice dribble down thro' de ground!"

"That's rather a handsome mantelpiece you have there, Mr. Binkston," said the visitor.

"Yes," replied Mr. Binkston, proudly. "That is a memorial to my wife."

"Why--I was not aware that Mrs. Binkston had passed away," said the visitor sympathetically.

"Oh no, indeed, she hasn't," smiled Mr. Binkston. "She is serving her thirtieth sojourn in jail. That mantelpiece is built of the bricks she was convicted of throwing."

MEMORY

"Uncle Mose," said a drummer, addressing an old colored man seated on a drygoods box in front of the village store, "they tell me that you remember seeing George Washington--am I mistaken?"

"No, sah," said Uncle Mose. "I uster 'member seein' him, but I done fo'got sence I jined de chu'ch."

A noted college president, attending a banquet in Boston, was surprised to see that the darky who took the hats at the door gave no checks in return.

"He has a most wonderful memory," a fellow diner explained. "He's been doing that for years and prides himself upon never having made a mistake."

As the college president was leaving, the darky passed him his hat.

"How do you know that this one is mine?"

"I don't know it, suh," admitted the darky.

"Then why do you give it to me?"

"'Cause yo' gave it to me, suh."

"Tommy," said his mother reprovingly, "what did I say I'd do to you if I ever caught you stealing jam again?"

Tommy thoughtfully scratched his head with his sticky fingers.

"Why, that's funny, ma, that you should forget it, too. Hanged if I can remember." Smith is a young New York lawyer, clever in many ways, but very forgetful. He was recently sent to St. Louis to interview an important client in regard to a case then pending in the Missouri courts. Later the head of his firm received this telegram from St. Louis:

"Have forgotten name of client. Please wire at once."

This was the reply sent from New York:

"Client's name Jenkins. Your name Smith."

When time who steals our years away
Shall steal our pleasures too,
The mem'ry of the past will stay
And half our joys renew.

--_Moore_.

The heart hath its own memory, like the mind,
And in it are enshrined
The precious keepsakes, into which is wrought
The giver's loving thought.

--_Longfellow_.

MEN

Here's to the men! God bless them!
Worst of me sins, I confess them!
In loving them all; be they great or small,
So here's to the boys! God bless them!

May all single men be married,
And all married men be happy.

"What is your ideal man?"

"One who is clever enough to make money and foolish enough to spend it!"

I have thought some of Nature's journeymen had made men and not made them well, they imitated humanity so abominably.--_Shakespeare_.

Men are four:
He who knows and knows not that he knows,--
He is asleep--wake him;
He who knows not and knows not that he knows not,--
He is a fool--shun him;
He who knows not and knows that he knows not,--
He is a child--teach him;
He who knows and knows that He knows,--
He is a king--follow him.

_See also_ Dogs; Husbands.

MESSAGES

"Have you the rent ready?"

"No, sir; mother's gone out washing and forgot to put it out for you."

"Did she tell you she'd forgotten?"

"Yes, sir."

One of the passengers on a wreck was an exceedingly nervous man, who, while floating in the water, imagined how his friends would acquaint his wife of his fate. Saved at last, he rushed to the telegraph office and sent this message: "Dear Pat, I am saved. Break it gently to my wife."

METAPHOR

It was a Washington woman, angry because the authorities had closed the woman's rest-room in the Senate office building, who burst out:

"It is almost as if the Senate had hurled its glove into the teeth of the advancing wave that is sounding the clarion of equal rights."

A water consumer in Los Angeles, California, whose supply had been turned off because he wouldn't pay, wrote to the department as follows:

"In the matter of shutting off the water on unpaid bills, your company is fast becoming a regular crystallized Russian bureaucracy, running in a groove and deaf to the appeals of reform. There is no use of your trying to impugn the verity of this indictment by shaking your official heads in the teeth of your own deeds.

"If you will persist in this kind of thing, a widespread conflagration of the populace will be so imminent that it will require only a spark to let loose the dogs of war in our midst. Will you persist in hurling the corner stone of our personal liberty to your wolfish hounds of collectors, thirsting for its blood? If you persist, the first thing you know you will have the chariot of a justly indignant revolution rolling along in our midst and gnashing its teeth as it rolls.

"If your rascally collectors are permitted to continue coming to our doors with unblushing footsteps, with cloaks of hypocritical compunction in their mouths, and compel payment from your patrons, this policy will result in cutting the wool off the sheep that lays the golden egg, until you have pumped it dry--and then farewell, a long farewell, to our vaunted prosperity."

MICE

"What's the matter with Briggs?"

"He was getting shaved by a lady barber when a mouse ran across the floor."--_Life_.

MIDDLE CLASSES

WILLIE--"Paw, what is the middle class?"

PAW--"The middle class consists of people who are not poor enough to accept charity and not rich enough to donate anything."

MILITANTS

_See_ Suffragettes.

MILITARY DISCIPLINE

Murphy was a new recruit in the cavalry. He could not ride at all, and by ill luck was given one of the most vicious horses in the troop.

"Remember," said the sergeant, "no one is allowed to dismount without orders."

Murphy was no sooner in the saddle than he was thrown to the ground.

"Murphy!" yelled the sergeant, when he discovered him lying breathless on the ground, "you dismounted!"

"I did."

"Did you have orders?"

"I did."

"From headquarters, I suppose?"

"No, sor; from hintquarters."

"How dare you come on parade," exclaimed an Irish sergeant to a recruit, "before a respictible man loike mysilf smothered from head to foot in graise an' poipe clay? Tell me now--answer me when I spake to yez!"

The recruit was about to excuse himself for his condition when the sergeant stopped him.

"Dare yez to answer me when I puts a question to yez?" he cried. "Hould yer lyin' tongue, and open your face at yer peril! Tell me now, what have ye been doin' wid yer uniform an' arms an' bills? Not a word, or I'll clap yez in the guardroom. When I axes yez anything an' yez spakes I'll have yez tried for insolence to yer superior officer, but if yez don't answer when I questions yez, I'll have yez punished for disobedience of orders! So, yez see, I have yez both ways!"

Mistake, error, is the discipline through which we advance.--_Channing_.

MILLINERS

Recipe for a milliner:

To a presence that's much more than queenly,
Add a manner that's quite Vere de Vere;
You feel like a worm in her sight when she says,
"Only $300, my dear!"

--_Life_.

MILLIONAIRES

Recipe for a multi-millionaire:

Take a boy with bare feet as a starter
Add thrift and sobriety, mixed--
Flavor with quarts of religion,
And see that the tariff is fixed.

--_Life_.

MILLIONAIRE (to a beggar)--"Be off with you this minute!"

BEGGAR--"Look 'ere, mister; the only difference between you and me is that you are makin' your second million, while I am still workin' at my first."

"Now that you have made $50,000,000, I suppose you are going to keep right on for the purpose of trying to get a hundred millions?"

"No, sir. You do me an injustice. I'm going to put in the rest of my time trying to get my conscience into a satisfactory condition."

"When I was a young man," said Mr. Cumrox, "I thought nothing of working twelve or fourteen hours a day."

"Father," replied the young man with sporty clothes, "I wish you wouldn't mention it. Those non-union sentiments are liable to make you unpopular."

No good man ever became suddenly rich.--_Syrus_.

And all to leave what with his toil he won,
To that unfeather'd two-legged thing, a son.

--_Dryden_.

_See also_ Capitalists.

MINORITIES

Stepping out between the acts at the first production of one of his plays, Bernard Shaw said to the audience:

"What do you think of it?"

This startled everybody for the time being, but presently a man in the pit assembled his scattered wits and cried:

"Rotten!"

Shaw made a curtsey and melted the house with one of his Irish smiles.

"My friend," he said, shrugging his shoulders and indicating the crowd in front, "I quite agree with you, but what are we two against so many?"

MISERS

There was an old man of Nantucket
Who kept all his cash in a bucket;
But his daughter, named Nan,
Ran away with a man--
And as for the bucket, Nantucket.

A mere madness, to live like a wretch, and die rich.--_Robert Burton_.

MISSIONARIES

SHE--"Poor cousin Jack! And to be eaten by those wretched cannibals!"

HE--"Yes, my dear child; but he gave them their first taste in religion!"

At a meeting of the Women's Foreign Missionary Society in a large city church a discussion arose among the members present as to the race of people that inhabited a far-away land. Some insisted that they were not a man-eating people; others that they were known to be cannibals. However, the question was finally decided by a minister's widow, who said:

"I beg pardon for interrupting, Mrs. Chairman, but I can assure you that they are cannibals. My husband was a missionary there and they ate him."

MISSIONS

"What in the world are you up to, Hilda?" exclaimed Mrs. Bale, as she entered the nursery where her six-year-old daughter was stuffing broken toys, headless dolls, ragged clothes and general debris into an open box.

"Why, mother," cried Hilda, "can't you see? I'm packing a missionary box just the way the ladies do; and it's all right," she added reassuringly, "I haven't put in a single thing that's any good at all!"

MISTAKEN IDENTITY

There was a young fellow named Paul,
Who went to a fancy dress ball;
They say, just for fun
He dressed up like a bun,
And was "et" by a dog in the hall.

A Scottish woman, who was spending her holidays in London, entered a bric-a-brac shop, in search of something odd to take home to Scotland with her. After she had inspected several articles, but had found none to suit her, she noticed a quaint figure, the head and shoulders of which appeared above the counter.

"What is that Japanese idol over there worth?" she inquired of the salesman.

The salesman's reply was given in a subdued tone:

"About half a million, madam. That's the proprietor!"

The late James McNeil Whistler was standing bareheaded in a hat shop, the clerk having taken his hat to another part of the shop for comparison. A man rushed in with his hat in his hand, and, supposing Whistler to be a clerk angrily confronted him.

"See here," he said, "this hat doesn't fit."

Whistler eyed the stranger critically from head to foot, and then drawled out:

"Well, neither does your coat. What's more, if you'll pardon my saying so, I'll be hanged if I care much for the color of your trousers."

The steamer was on the point of leaving, and the passengers lounged on the deck and waited for the start. At length one of them espied a cyclist in the far distance, and it soon became evident that he was doing his level best to catch the boat.

Already the sailors' hands were on the gangways, and the cyclist's chance looked small indeed. Then a sportive passenger wagered a sovereign to a shilling that he would miss it. The offer was taken, and at once the deck became a scene of wild excitement.

"He'll miss it."

"No; he'll just do it."

"Come on!"

"He won't do it."

"Yes, he will. He's done it. Hurrah!"

In the very nick of time the cyclist arrived, sprang off his machine, and ran up the one gangway left.

"Cast off!" he cried.

It was the captain.

Much to the curious little girl's disgust, her elder sister and her girl friends had quickly closed the door of the back parlor, before she could wedge her small self in among them.

She waited uneasily for a little while, then she knocked. No response. She knocked again. Still no attention. Her curiosity could be controlled no longer. "Dodo!" she called in staccato tones as she knocked once again. "'Tain't me! It's Mamma!"

MOLLYCODDLES

"Tommy, why don't you play with Frank any more?" asked Tommy's mother, who noticed that he was cultivating the acquaintance of a new boy on the block. "I thought you were such good chums."

"We was," replied Tommy superciliously, "but he's a mollycoddle. He paid t' git into the ball-grounds."

MONEY

In some of the college settlements there are penny savings banks for children.

One Saturday a small boy arrived with an important air and withdrew 2 cents from his account. Monday morning he promptly returned the money.

"So you didn't spend your 2 cents?" observed the worker in charge.

"Oh, no," he replied, "but a fellow just likes to have a little cash on hand over Sunday."

_See also_ Domestic finance.

MORAL EDUCATION

Two little boys, four and five years old respectively, were playing quietly, when the one of four years struck the other on his cheek. An interested bystander stepped up and asked him why he had hit the other who had done nothing.

"Well," replied the pugilistic one, "last Sunday our lesson in Sunday-school was about if a fellow hit you on the left cheek turn the other and get another crack, and I just wanted to see if Bobbie knew his lesson."

MOSQUITOES

Senator Gore, of Oklahoma, while addressing a convention in Oklahoma City recently, told this story, illustrating a point he made:

"A northern gentleman was being entertained by a southern colonel on a fishing-trip. It was his first visit to the South, and the mosquitoes were so bothersome that he was unable to sleep, while at the same time he could hear his friend snoring audibly.

"The next morning he approached the old darky who was doing the cooking.

"'Jim,' he said, 'how is it the colonel is able to sleep so soundly with so many mosquitoes around?'

"'I'll tell yo', boss,' the darky replied, 'de fust part of de night de kernel is too full to pay any 'tenshum to de skeeters, and de last part of de night de skeeters is too full to pay any 'tenshum to de kernel.'"

_See also_ Applause; New Jersey.

MOTHERS

While reconnoitering in Westmoreland County, Virginia, one of General Washington's officers chanced upon a fine team of horses driven before a plow by a burly slave. Finer animals he had never seen. When his eyes had feasted on their beauty he cried to the driver: "Hello good fellow! I must have those horses. They are just such animals as I have been looking for."

The black man grinned, rolled up the whites of his eyes, put the lash to the horses' flanks and turned up another furrow in the rich soil.

The officer waited until he had finished the row; then throwing back his cavalier cloak the ensign of the rank dazzled the slave's eyes.

"Better see missus! Better see missus!" he cried waving his hand to the south, where above the cedar growth rose the towers of a fine old Virginia mansion.

The officer turned up the carriage road and soon was rapping the great brass knocker of the front door.

Quickly the door swung upon its ponderous hinges and a grave, majestic-looking woman confronted the visitor with an air of inquiry.

"Madam," said the officer doffing his cap and overcome by her dignity, "I have come to claim your horses in the name of the Government."

"My horses?" said she, bending upon him a pair of eyes born to command. "Sir, you cannot have them. My crops are out and I need my horses in the field."

"I am sorry," said the officer, "but I must have them, madam. Such are the orders of my chief."

"Your chief? Who is your chief, pray?" she demanded with restrained warmth.

"The commander of the American army, General George Washington," replied the other, squaring his shoulders and swelling his pride.

A smile of triumph softened the sternness of the woman's features. "You go and tell General George Washington for me," said she, "that his mother says he cannot have her horses."

The wagons of "the greatest show on earth" passed up the avenue at daybreak. Their incessant rumbling soon awakened ten-year-old Billie and five-year-old brother Robert. Their mother feigned sleep as the two white-robed figures crept past her bed into the hall, on the way to investigate. Robert struggled manfully with the unaccustomed task of putting on his clothes. "Wait for me, Billie," his mother heard him beg. "You'll get ahead of me."

"Get mother to help you," counseled Billie, who was having troubles of his own.

Mother started to the rescue, and then paused as she heard the voice of her younger, guarded but anxious and insistent.

"_You_ ask her, Billie. You've known her longer than I have."

A little girl, being punished by her mother flew, white with rage, to her desk, wrote on a piece of paper, and then going out in the yard she dug a hole in the ground, put the paper in it and covered it over. The mother, being interested in her child's doings, went out after the little girl had gone away, dug up the paper and read:

_Dear Devil_:
Please come and take my mamma away.

One morning a little girl hung about the kitchen bothering the busy cook to death. The cook lost patience finally. "Clear out o' here, ye sassy little brat!" she shouted, thumping the table with a rolling-pin.

The little girl gave the cook a haughty look. "I never allow any one but my mother to speak to me like that," she said.

The public-spirited lady met the little boy on the street. Something about his appearance halted her. She stared at him in her near-sighted way.

THE LADY--"Little boy, haven't you any home?"

THE LITTLE BOY--"Oh, yes'm; I've got a home."

THE LADY--"And loving parents?"

THE LITTLE BOY--"Yes'm."

THE LADY--"I'm afraid you do not know what love really is. Do your parents look after your moral welfare?"

THE LITTLE BOY--"Yes'm."

THE LADY--"Are they bringing you up to be a good and helpful citizen?"

THE LITTLE BOY--"Yes'm."

THE LADY--"Will you ask your mother to come and hear me talk on 'When Does a Mother's Duty to Her Child Begin?' next Saturday afternoon, at three o'clock, at Lyceum Hall?"

THE LITTLE BOY (explosively)--"What's th' matter with you ma! Don't you know me? I'm your little boy!"

Here's to the happiest hours of my life--
Spent in the arms of another man's wife:
My mother!

Happy he
With such a mother! faith in womankind
Beats with his blood, and trust in all things high
Comes easy to him, and though he trip and fall,
He shall not blind his soul with clay.

--_Tennyson_.

Women know
The way to rear up children (to be just);
They know a simple, merry, tender knack
Of tying sashes, fitting baby-shoes,
And stringing pretty words that make no sense,
And kissing full sense into empty words;
Which things are corals to cut life upon,
Although such trifles.

--_E. B. Browning_

MOTHERS-IN-LAW

Justice David J. Brewer was asked not long ago by a man.

"Will you please tell me, sir, what is the extreme penalty for bigamy?"

Justice Brewer smiled and answered:

"Two mothers-in-law."

SHE--"And so you are going to be my son-in-law?"

HE--"By Jove! I hadn't thought of that."

WAITER--"Have another glass, sir?"

HUSBAND (to his wife)--"Shall I have another glass, Henrietta?"

WIFE (to her mother)--"Shall he have another, mother?"

A blackmailer wrote the following to a wealthy business man: "Send me $5,000 or I will abduct your mother-in-law."

To which the business man replied: "Sorry I am short of funds, but your proposition interests me."

An undertaker telegraphed to a man that his mother-in-law had died and asked whether he should bury, embalm or cremate her. The man replied, "All three, take no chances."

MOTORCYCLES

The automobile was a thing unheard of to a mountaineer in one community, and he was very much astonished one day when he saw one go by without any visible means of locomotion. His eyes bulged, however, when a motorcycle followed closely in its wake and disappeared like a flash around a bend in the road.

"Gee whiz!" he said, turning to his son, "who'd 'a' s'posed that thing had a colt?"

MOUNTAINS

Some real-estate dealers in British Columbia were accused of having victimized English and Scotch settlers by selling to them (at long range) fruit ranches which were situated on the tops of mountains. It is said that the captain of a steamboat on Kootenay Lake once heard a great splash in the water. Looking over the rail, he spied the head of a man who was swimming toward his boat. He hailed him. "Do you know," said the swimmer, "this is the third time to-day that I've fallen off that bally old ranch of mine?"

MOVING PICTURES

"Your soldiers look fat and happy. You must have a war chest." "Not exactly, but things are on a higher plane than they used to be. This revolution is being financed by a moving-picture concern."

MUCK-RAKING

The way of the transgressor is well written up.

MULES

Gen. O.O. Howard, as is well known, is a man of deep religious principles, and in the course of the war he divided his time pretty equally between fighting and evangelism. Howard's brigade was known all through the army as the Christian brigade, and he was very proud of it.

There was one hardened old sinner in the brigade, however, whose ears were deaf to all exhortation. General Howard was particularly anxious to convert this man, and one day he went down in the teamsters' part of the camp where the man was on duty. He talked with him long and earnestly about religion and finally said:

"I want to see you converted. Won't you come to the mourners' bench at the next service?"

The erring one rubbed his head thoughtfully for a moment and then replied:

"General, I'm plumb willin' to be converted, but if I am, seein' that everyone else has got religion, who in blue blazes is goin' to drive the mules?"

MUNICIPAL GOVERNMENT

"What's the trouble in Plunkville?"

"We've tried a mayor and we've tried a commission."

"Well?"

"Now we're thinking of offering the management of our city to some good magazine."

MUSEUMS

It had been anything but an easy afternoon for the teacher who took six of her pupils through the Museum of Natural History, but their enthusiastic interest in the stuffed animals and their open-eyed wonder at the prehistoric fossils amply repaid her.

"Well, boys, where have you been all afternoon?" asked the father of two of the party that evening.

The answer came back with joyous promptness: "Oh, pop! Teacher took us to a dead circus."

Two Marylanders, who were visiting the National Museum at Washington, were seen standing in front of an Egyptian mummy, over which hung a placard bearing the inscription. "B.C. 1187."

Both visitors were much mystified thereby. Said one:

"What do you make of that, Bill?"

"Well," said Bill, "I dunno; but maybe it was the number of the motor-car that killed him."--_Edwin Tarrisse_.

MUSIC

The musical young woman who dropped her peekaboo waist in the piano player and turned out a Beethoven sonata, has her equal in the lady who stood in front of a five-bar fence and sang all the dots on her veil.

A thief broke into a Madison avenue mansion early the other morning and found himself in the music-room. Hearing footsteps approaching, he took refuge behind a screen.

From eight to nine o'clock the eldest daughter had a singing lesson.

From nine to ten o'clock the second daughter took a piano lesson.

From ten to eleven o'clock the eldest son had a violin lesson.

From eleven to twelve o'clock the other son had a lesson on the flute.

At twelve-fifteen all the brothers and sisters assembled and studied an ear-splitting piece for voice, piano, violin and flute.

The thief staggered out from behind the screen at twelve-forty-five, and falling at their feet, cried:

"For Heaven's sake, have me arrested!"

A lady told Swinburne that she would render on the piano a very ancient Florentine retornello which had just been discovered. She then played "Three blind mice" and Swinburne was enchanted. He found that it reflected to perfection the cruel beauty of the Medicis--which, perhaps, it does.--_Edmund Gosse_.

The accomplished and obliging pianist had rendered several selections, when one of the admiring group of listeners in the hotel parlor suggested Mozart's Twelfth Mass. Several people echoed the request, but one lady was particularly desirous of hearing the piece, explaining that her husband had belonged to that very regiment.

Dinner was a little late. A guest asked the hostess to play something. Seating herself at the piano, the good woman executed a Chopin nocturne with precision. She finished, and there was still an interval of waiting to be bridged. In the grim silence she turned to an old gentleman on her right and said:

"Would you like a sonata before going in to dinner?"

He gave a start of surprise and pleasure as he responded briskly:

"Why, yes, thanks! I had a couple on my way here, but I could stand another."

Music is the universal language of mankind.--_Longfellow_.

I even think that, sentimentally, I am disposed to harmony. But organically I am incapable of a tune.--_Charles Lamb_.

There's music in the sighing of a reed;
There's music in the gushing of a rill;
There's music in all things, if men had ears:
Their earth is but an echo of the spheres.

--_Byron_.

MUSICIANS

FATHER--"Well, sonny, did you take your dog to the 'vet' next door to your house, as I suggested?"

BOY--"Yes, sir."

FATHER-"And what did he say?"

BOY--"'E said Towser was suffering from nerves, so Sis had better give up playin' the pianner."

The "celebrated pianiste," Miss Sharpe, had concluded her recital. As the resultant applause was terminating, Mrs. Rochester observed Colonel Grayson wiping his eyes. The old gentleman noticed her look, and, thinking it one of inquiry, began to explain the cause of his sadness. "The girl's playing," he told the lady, "reminded me so much of the playing of her father. He used to be a chum of mine in the Army of the Potomac."

"Oh, indeed!" cooed Mrs. Rochester, with a conventional show of interest. "I never knew her father was a piano-player."

"He wasn't," replied the Colonel. "He was a drummer."--_G.T. Evans_.

Recipe for an orchestra leader:

Four hundred and twenty-two movements--
Emanuel, Swedish and Swiss--
It's a wonder the hand can keep playing,
You'd think they'd die laughing at this!

--_Life_.

'Tis God gives skill,
But not without men's hands: He could not make
Antonio Stradivari's violins
Without Antonio.

--_George Eliot_.

NAMES, PERSONAL

Israel Zangwill, the well-known writer, signs himself I. Zangwill. He was once approached at a reception by a fussy old lady, who demanded, "Oh, Mr. Zangwill, what is your Christian name?"

"Madame, I have none," he gravely assured her.--_John Pearson_.

FRIEND-"So your great Russian actor was a total failure?"

MANAGER-"Yes. It took all our profits to pay for running the electric light sign with his name on it."--_Puck_.

A somewhat unpatriotic little son of Italy, twelve years old, came to his teacher in the public school and asked if he could not have his name changed.

"Why do you wish to change your name?" the teacher asked.

"I want to be an American. I live in America now. I no longer want to be a Dago."

"What American name would you like to have?"

"I have it here," he said, handing the teacher a dirty scrap of paper on which was written--Patrick Dennis McCarty.

A shy young man once said to a young lady: "I wish dear, that we were on such terms of intimacy that you would not mind calling me by my first name."

"Oh," she replied, "your second name is good enough for me."

An American travelling in Europe engaged a courier. Arriving at an inn in Austria, the man asked his servant to enter his name in accordance with the police regulations of that country. Some time after, the man asked the servant if he had complied with his orders.

"Yes, sir," was the reply.

"How did you write my name?" asked the master.

"Well, sir, I can't pronounce it," answered the servant, "but I copied it from your portmanteau, sir."

"Why, my name isn't there. Bring me the book." The register was brought, and, instead of the plain American name of two syllables, the following entry was revealed:

"Monsieur Warranted Solid Leather."

--_M.A. Hitchcock_.

The story is told of Helen Hunt, the famous author of "Ramona," that one morning after church service she found a purse full of money and told her pastor about it.

"Very well," he said, "you keep it, and at the evening service I will announce it," which he did in this wise:

"This morning there was found in this church a purse filled with money. If the owner is present he or she can go to Helen Hunt for it."

And the minister wondered why the congregation tittered!

A street-car "masher" tried in every way to attract the attention of the pretty young girl opposite him. Just as he had about given up, the girl, entirely unconscious of what had been going on, happened to glance in his direction. The "masher" immediately took fresh courage.

"It's cold out to-day, isn't it?" he ventured.

The girl smiled and nodded assent, but had nothing to say.

"My name is Specknoodle," he volunteered.

"Oh, I am so sorry," she said sympathetically, as she left the car.

The comedian came on with affected diffidence.

"At our last stand," quoth he, "I noticed a man laughing while I was doing my turn. Honest, now! My, how he laughed! He laughed until he split. Till he split, mind you. Thinks I to myself, I'll just find out about the man and so, when the show was over, I went up to him.

"My friend," says I, "I've heard that there's nothing in a name, but are you not one of the Wood family?"

"I am," says he, "and what's more, my grandfather was a Pine!"

"No Wood, you know, splits any easier than a Pine."--_Ramsey Benson_.

"But Eliza," said the mistress, "your little boy was christened George Washington. Why do you call him Izaak Walton? Walton, you know, was the famous fisherman."

"Yes'm," answered Eliza, "but dat chile's repetashun fo' telling de troof made dat change imper'tive."

The mother of the girl baby, herself named Rachel, frankly told her husband that she was tired of the good old names borne by most of the eminent members of the family, and she would like to give the little girl a name entirely different. Then she wrote on a slip of paper "Eugénie," and asked her husband if he didn't think that was a pretty name.

The father studied the name for a moment and then said: "Vell, call her Yousheenie, but I don't see vat you gain by it."

There was a great swell in Japan,
Whose name on a Tuesday began;
It lasted through Sunday
Till twilight on Monday,
And sounded like stones in a can.

He was a young lawyer who had just started practicing in a small town and hung his sign outside of his office door. It read: "A. Swindler." A stranger who called to consult him saw the sign and said: "My goodness, man, look at that sign! Don't you see how it reads? Put in your first name--Alexander, Ambrose or whatever it is."

"Oh, yes I know," said the lawyer resignedly, "but I don't exactly like to do it."

"Why not?" asked the client. "It looks mighty bad as it is. What is your first name?"

"Adam."

Who hath not own'd, with rapture-smitten frame,
The power of grace, the magic of a name.

--_Campbell_.

NATIVES

FRIEND (admiring the prodigy)--"Seventh standard, is she? Plays the planner an' talks French like a native, I'll bet."

FOND BUT "TOUCHY" PARENT--"I've no doubt that's meant to be very funny, Bill Smith; but as it 'appens you're only exposin' your ignorance; they ain't natives in France--they're as white as wot we are."--_Sketch_.

NATURE LOVERS

"Would you mind tooting your factory whistle a little?"

"What for?"

"For my father over yonder in the park. He's a trifle deaf and he hasn't heard a robin this summer."

NAVIGATION

The fog was dense and the boat had stopped when the old lady asked the Captain why he didn't go on.

"Can't see up the river, madam."

"But, Captain," she persisted, "I can see the stars overhead."

"Yes, ma'am," said the Captain, "but until the boilers bust we ain't goin' that way."

NEATNESS

The neatness of the New England housekeeper is a matter of common remark, and husbands in that part of the country are supposed to appreciate their advantages.

A bit of dialogue reported as follows shows that there may be another side to the matter.

"Martha, have you wiped the sink dry yet?" asked the farmer, as he made final preparations for the night.

"Yes, Josiah," she replied. "Why do you ask?"

"Well, I did want a drink, but I guess I can get along until morning."

NEGROES

A colored girl asked the drug clerk for "ten cents' wuth o' cou't-plaster."

"What color," he asked.

"Flesh cullah, suh."

Whereupon the clerk proffered a box of black court plaster.

The girl opened the box with a deliberation that was ominous, but her face was unruffled as she noted the color of the contents and said:

"I ast for flesh cullah, an' you done give me skin cullah." A cart containing a number of negro field hands was being drawn by a mule. The driver, a darky of about twenty, was endeavoring to induce the mule to increase its speed, when suddenly the animal let fly with its heels and dealt him such a kick on the head that he was stretched on the ground in a twinkling. He lay rubbing his woolly pate where the mule had kicked him.

"Is he hurt?" asked a stranger anxiously of an older negro who had jumped from the conveyance and was standing over the prostrate driver.

"No, Boss," was the older man's reply; "dat mule will probably walk kind o' tendah for a day or two, but he ain't hurt."

In certain parts of the West Indies the negroes speak English with a broad brogue. They are probably descended from the slaves of the Irish adventurers who accompanied the Spanish settlers.

A gentleman from Dublin upon arriving at a West Indian port was accosted by a burly negro fruit vender with, "Th, top uv th' mornin' to ye, an' would ye be after wantin' to buy a bit o' fruit, sor?"

The Irishman stared at him in amazement.

"An' how long have ye been here?" he finally asked.

"Goin' on three months, yer Honor," said the vender, thinking of the time he had left his inland home.

"Three months, is it? Only three months an' as black as thot? Faith, I'll not land!"

Dinah, crying bitterly, was coming down the street with her feet bandaged.

"Why, what on earth's the matter?" she was asked. "How did you hurt your feet, Dinah?"

"Dat good fo' nothin' nigger [sniffle] done hit me on de haid wif a club while I was standin' on de hard stone pavement."

"'Liza, what fo' yo' buy dat udder box of shoe-blacknin'?"

"Go on, Nigga', dat ain't shoe-blacknin', dat's ma massage cream!"

"Johnny," said the mother as she vigorously scrubbed the small boy's face with soap and water, "didn't I tell you never to blacken your face again? Here I've been scrubbing for half an hour and it won't come off."

"I--I--ouch!" sputtered the small boy; "I ain't your little boy. I--ouch! I'se Mose, de colored lady's little boy."

The day before she was to be married an old negro servant came to her mistress and intrusted her savings to her keeping.

"Why should I keep your money for you? I thought you were going to be married?" said the mistress.

"So I is, Missus, but do you 'spose I'd keep all dis yer money in de house wid dat strange nigger?"

A southern colonel had a colored valet by the name of George. George received nearly all the colonel's cast-off clothing. He had his eyes on a certain pair of light trousers which were not wearing out fast enough to suit him, so he thought he would hasten matters somewhat by rubbing grease on one knee. When the colonel saw the spot, he called George and asked if he had noticed it. George said, "Yes, sah, Colonel, I noticed dat spot and tried mighty hard to get it out, but I couldn't."

"Have you tried gasoline?" the colonel asked.

"Yes, sah, Colonel, but it didn't do no good."

"Have you tried brown paper and a hot iron?"

"Yes, sah, Colonel, I'se done tried 'mos' everything I knows of, but dat spot wouldn't come out."

"Well, George, have you tried ammonia?" the colonel asked as a last resort.

"No, sah, Colonel, I ain't tried 'em on yet, but I knows dey'll fit."

A negro went into a hardware shop and asked to be shown some razors, and after critically examining those submitted to him the would-be purchaser was asked why he did not try a "safety," to which he replied: "I ain' lookin' for that kind. I wants this for social purposes."

Before a house where a colored man had died, a small darkey was standing erect at one side of the door. It was about time for the services to begin, and the parson appeared from within and said to the darkey: "De services are about to begin. Aren't you a-gwine in?"

"I'se would if I'se could, parson," answered the little negro, "but yo' see I'se de crape."

_See also_ Chicken stealing.

NEIGHBORS

THE MAN AT THE DOOR--"Madame, I'm the piano-tuner."

THE WOMAN--"I didn't send for a piano-tuner."

THE MAN--"I know it, lady; the neighbors did."

NEW JERSEY

"You must have had a terrible experience with no food, and mosquitoes swarming around you," I said to the shipwrecked mariner who had been cast upon the Jersey sands.

"You just bet I had a terrible experience," he acknowledged. "My experience was worse than that of the man who wrote 'Water, water everywhere, but not a drop to drink.' With me it was bites, bites everywhere, but not a bite to eat."

NEW YORK CITY

At a convention of Methodist Bishops held in Washington, the Bishop of New York made a stirring address extolling the powers and possibilities of his state. Bishop Hamilton, of California, like all good Californians, is imbued with the conviction that it would be hard to equal a place he knows of on the Pacific, and following the Bishop of New York he gave a glowing picture of California, concluding:

"Not only is it the best place on earth to live in, but it has superior advantages, too, as a place to die in; for there we have at our threshold the beautiful Golden Gate, while in New York they only have--well, you know which gate it is over at New York!" One night Dave Warfield was playing at David Belasco's new theatre, supported by one of Mr. Belasco's new companies. The performance ran with a smoothness of a Standard Oil lawyer explaining rebates to a Federal court. A worthy person of the farming classes, sitting in G 14, was plainly impressed. In an interval between the acts he turned to the metropolitan who had the seat next him.

"Where do all them troopers come from?" he inquired.

"I don't think I understand," said the city-dweller.

"I mean them actors up yonder on the stage," explained the man from afar. "Was they brought on specially for this show, or do they live here?"

"I believe most of them live here in town," said the New Yorker.

"Well, they do purty blamed well for home talent," said the stranger.

A traveler in Tennessee came across an aged negro seated in front of his cabin door basking in the sunshine.

"He could have walked right on the stage for an Uncle Tom part without a line of makeup," says the traveler. "He must have been eighty years of age."

"Good morning, uncle," says the stranger.

"Mornin', sah! Mornin'," said the aged one. Then he added, "Be you the gentleman over yonder from New York?"

Being told that such was the case the old darky said; "Do you mind telling me something that has been botherin' my old haid? I have got a grandson--he runs on the Pullman cyars--and he done tell me that up thar in New York you-all burn up youah folks when they die. He is a poherful liar, and I don't believe him."

"Yes," replied the other, "that is the truth in some cases. We call it cremation."

"Well, you suttenly surprise me," said the negro and then he paused as if in deep reflection. Finally he said: "You-all know I am a Baptist. I believe in the resurrection and the life everlastin' and the coming of the Angel Gabriel and the blowin' of that great horn, and Lawdy me, how am they evah goin' to find them folks on that great mawnin'?"

It was too great a task for an offhand answer, and the suggestion was made that the aged one consult his minister. Again the negro fell into a brown study, and then he raised his head and his eyes twinkled merrily, and he said in a soft voice:

"Meanin' no offense, sah, but from what Ah have heard about New York I kinder calcerlate they is a lot of them New York people that doan' wanter be found on that mornin'."

NEWS

Soon after the installation of the telegraph in Fredericksburg, Virginia, a little darky, the son of my father's mammy, saw a piece of newspaper that had blown up on the telegraph wires and caught there. Running to my grandmother in a great state of excitement, he cried, "Miss Liza, come quick! Dem wires done buss and done let all the news out!"--_Sue M.M. Halsey_.

"Our whole neighborhood has been stirred up," said the regular reader.

The editor of the country weekly seized his pen. "Tell me about it," he said. "What we want is news. What stirred it up?"

"Plowing," said the farmer.

There is nothing new except what is forgotten.--_Mademoiselle Berlin_.

NEWSPAPERS

A kind old gentleman seeing a small boy who was carrying a lot of newspapers under his arm said: "Don't all those papers make you tired, my boy?"

"Naw, I don't read 'em," replied the lad.

VOX POPULI--"Do you think you've boosted your circulation by giving a year's subscription for the biggest potato raised in the county?"

THE EDITOR--"Mebbe not; but I got four barrels of samples."

COLONEL HIGHFLYER--"What are your rates per column?"

EDITOR OF "SWELL SOCIETY"--"For insertion or suppression?"--_Life_.

EDITOR--"You wish a position as a proofreader?"

APPLICANT--"Yes, sir."

"Do you understand the requirements of that responsible position?"

"Perfectly, sir. Whenever you make any mistakes in the paper, just blame 'em on me, and I'll never say a word."

A prominent Montana newspaper man was making the round of the insane asylum of that state in an official capacity as an inspector. One of the inmates mistook him for a recent arrival.

"What made you go crazy?"

"I was trying to make money out of the newspaper business," replied the editor, to humor the demented one.

"Rats, you're not crazy; you're just a plain darn fool," was the lunatic's comment.

"Did you write this report on my lecture, 'The Curse of Whiskey'?"

"Yes, madam."

"Then kindly explain what you mean by saying, 'The lecturer was evidently full of her subject!'"

We clip the following for the benefit of those who doubt the power of the press:

"Owing to the overcrowded condition of our columns, a number of births and deaths are unavoidably postponed this week."

"Binks has sued us for libel," announced the assistant editor of the sensational paper.

The managing editor's face brightened.

"Tell him," he said, "that if he will put up a strong fight we'll cheerfully pay the damages and charge them up to the advertising account."

Booth Tarkington says that in no state have the newspapers more "journalistic enterprise" than in his native Indiana. While stopping at a little Hoosier hotel in the course of a hunting trip Mr. Tarkington lost one of his dogs.

"Have you a newspaper in town?" he asked of the landlord.

"Right across the way, there, back of the shoemaker's," the landlord told him. "The _Daily News_--best little paper of its size in the state."

The editor, the printer, and the printer's devil were all busy doing justice to Mr. Tarkington with an "in-our-midst" paragraph when the novelist arrived.

"I've just lost a dog," Tarkington explained after he had introduced himself, "and I'd like to have you insert this ad for me: 'Fifty dollars reward for the return of a pointer dog answering to the name of Rex. Disappeared from the yard of the Mansion House Monday night.'"

"Why, we are just going to press, sir," the editor said, "but we'll be only too glad to hold the edition for your ad."

Mr. Tarkington returned to the hotel. After a few minutes he decided, however, that it might be well to add, "No questions asked" to his advertisement, and returned to the _Daily News_ office.

The place was deserted, save for the skinny little freckle-faced devil, who sat perched on a high stool, gazing wistfully out of the window.

"Where is everybody?" Tarkington asked.

"Gawn to hunt for th' dawg," replied the boy.

"You are the greatest inventor in the world," exclaimed a newspaper man to Alexander Graham Bell.

"Oh, no, my friend, I'm not," said Professor Bell. "I've never been a reporter."

Not long ago a city editor in Ottumwa, Iowa, was told over the telephone that a prominent citizen had just died suddenly. He called a reporter and told him to rush out and get the "story." Twenty minutes later the reporter returned, sat down at his desk, and began to rattle off copy on his typewriter.

"Well, what about it?" asked the city editor.