HUMOROUS
Reading edition
OLD SHOES.
How much a man is like old shoes! For instance, both a soul may lose; Both have been tanned; both are made tight By cobblers; both get left and right; Both need a mate to be complete, And both are made to go on feet. They both need heeling, oft are sold, And both in time all turn to mold. With shoes the last is first; with men The first shall be last; and when The shoes wear out they’re mended new: When men wear out they’re men-dead, too. They both are trod upon, and both Will tread on others, nothing loath. Both have their ties, and both incline When polished in the world to shine: And both peg out—and would you choose To be a man or be his shoes?
An Obstinate Wife.
The other night a policeman who was patrolling High street east, heard a whistle blown, followed by shouts for “police!” and after a run of half a block he came to a halt in front of a house where a second-story window was raised and a man had half his length over the sill.
“What’s the row?” demanded the officer.
“Some purglars vhas in mein house!” was the answer.
“How do you know?”
“I hears ’em make a noise more ash six times!”
“Where are they?”
“Down in der kitchen!”
“Have you been down to look around?”
“No! no! I tells my vhife to go, but she won’t stir! She shumps into bedt und covers oop her headt, und I vhas left to do all der fighting und be kilt! Dot’s der kind of a vhife she vhas!”
The officer investigated, to find that cats were responsible for the noises, and as he retired the householder was calling to his wife:
“Mary, if you go down I shtand on der stairs mit a light und a shot-gun und shoot eafery burglar like tunder.”
Wanted Weather-Strips.
“Didn’t I leave an order here three days ago for weather-strips?” demanded an indignant citizen of the proprietor of a Woodward avenue store yesterday.
“Yes, sir, you did.”
“And didn’t you say you would send a man to put them on?”
“I did.”
“And he was sick, I suppose?”
“No, sir; he went up there two days ago.”
“And put on the strips?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Where?”
“On the front and side doors, of course.”
“On the doors—of course—who in Halifax ordered them on the doors of the house? I wanted them strips for the barn doors!”
“You did?”
“Certainly I did. Do you suppose I want draughts of air sweeping in on my poor horses this kind o’ weather?”
It’s a Telephone.
A well-to-do but unsophisticated back-woodsman was in the city lately, attending the Fat Stock Show, and brought along his wife and daughters to see the sights and do some shopping. Among other places they visited was Mandel’s new store, and after wandering around the first floor for a while the party came to a stop near the elevators.
One of the daughters was first to discover the cars moving silently up and down, receiving and discharging their cargoes of passengers. She jerked her father’s coat sleeve to direct his attention to the phenomenon, and in a tone that was audible to the clerks in the neighborhood asked:
“What’s that, paw—that thing going up and down, with sofys in it?”
The old man gave the elevator a long, calm, deliberate, scrutinizing stare, and exclaimed with joy:
“By gosh! it’s a telephone! the first I ever saw!”
An Emergency.
A few days ago a man with a weak and humble expression, and wearing a summer suit of clothes, applied to one of the railroad passenger agents for a dead-head pass to Toledo.
“Why when do you want to go to Toledo?”
“To get married.”
“And you haven’t any money?”
“Not above twenty-five cents.”
“Hadn’t you better be worth your fare to Toledo before taking a wife on your hands to support?”
“You don’t understand the case,” protested the man. “I’m going to marry a widow worth at least $5,000, and the first thing I shall do will be to remit you the price of a ticket. I’m poor, and the widow knows it, but she marries me for love.”
He protested so long and earnestly that he was finally passed down the road. Two days elapsed, and then a letter was received from him saying:
“Heaven bless you for your kindness? Reached here all right, and married the widow according to programme. It turns out that she isn’t worth a copper. In this emergency may I ask you to pass us both to Detroit, where I have hopes of striking a job?”
The fellow who went into a sink hole clear to his nose remarked that it wasn’t much, as he had only gotten in up to his sneeze, and he had gum boots on.
“We have struck smoother road, haven’t we?” asked a passenger of a conductor on an Arkansas railway. “No.” replied the conductor. “We have only run off the track.”
Has it ever occurred to you that the initials N. J. stand not only for New Jersey, but New Jerusalem? There’s the same uncertainty of significance in certain words beginning with H—one of which is Heaven.
“You are the most stuck-up chap I ever saw,” remarked a young lady to a youth whom she met at a taffy pull. To which he replied: “And you are just as sweet as you are candid.” Another leap-year horror.
“Rebecca,” said Mose Schaumberg, an Austin merchant prince to his wife. “I vants you to gif me your photograph.” “Und vat in the vorld do you vant mit mine photograph?” inquired the wife. “I vants to paste it on mine pipe. Times vas so pad dad I vants to preak mineself of smoking,” answered Mose.
“Your visits remind me of the growth of a successful newspaper,” said Uncle Jabez, leaning his chin on his cane, and glancing at William Arthur, who was sweet on Angelica. “Why so?” inquired William. “Well, they commenced as a weekly, grew to be a tri-weekly, and have now become daily, with a weekly supplement.”
They were returning home from the theatre and had nearly reached her home, when the young man observed: “Isn’t the weather cold and raw?” She must have misunderstood him. “Raw,” she said, rather hesitatingly. “Yes, I like them raw, but,” she continued, looking sweetly in his eyes, “don’t you think they are nicer fried?” What could he do?
One more unfortunate: Mamma (a widow of considerable personal attractions)—“I want to tell you something, Tommy. You saw that gentleman talking to grandmamma in the other room. Well, he is going to be your new papa. Mamma’s going to marry him.” Tommy (who recollects something of the life his old papa used to lead)—“D-d-does he know it yet mamma?”
“Doctor,” said our young man to a jocular dentist, “I hear you’ve been saying that I’ve got a mouth that always reminds you of the mouth of the Mississippi. Is that so?” “Of course not, my dear boy,” said Burton. “I never said anything so cruel. All I said was that when I was reaching for one of your rear snags I always felt safer when I had a life-preserver around me.”
Queen Victoria took the second prize at the York show with a yearling heifer from her Balmoral farm, and she kicked like a steer because she didn’t get the first. The heifer did, not Victoria. Er himperial majesty kicked too, because the first prize is one shilling thruppence, while the second is only one shilling tuppence happeny, but her protest of course was made in a most majestic and lady-like manner.—Hawkeye.
Some of the richest men in Austin started in life in a very modest way, and are still plain, unpretentious people, but their sons put on a great deal of style. One of the latter, who was better posted about other people’s affairs than his own family’s remarked sneeringly to an acquaintance: “Your father was nothing but a simple stonemason.” “I know where you got that information,” quietly remarked the other. “From whom did I get it?” “From your father.” “How do you know that?” “Because your father used to be my father’s hod-carrier.”
It is a base slander upon the goat to say he eats tomato can labels and circus poster and old hoop skirts and things because he likes them. He is driven to this coarse, and not very nutritious fare, by hard times and destitution. When he can stand on his hind legs and eat his luxurious way along a clothes-line, all the circus posters in the world can’t lure him away from the night shirt and the par boiled sheet. Be just to the goat. And how he does love a coil of manilla rope or a rubber door mat. The fact is, the goat is gifted with a fine rather epicurean taste, and if we could afford to feed him the things he is fond of he would never touch a tomato can.—Hawkeye.
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