CLOTHES AND THE MAN
_Debt Collector_: "Is your master at home?"
_Servant_ (curtly): "No, he isn"t."
_Debt Collector_ (suspiciously): "But I can see his hat hanging up in the hall."
_Servant_: "Well, what"s that got to do with it? One of my dresses is hanging on the line in the back garden, but I"m not there!"
A WITTY REPLY
One day a celebrated advocate was arguing before a very stupid and very rude Scotch judge who, to express his contempt of what he was saying, pointed with one forefinger to one of his ears, and with the other to the opposite one.
"You see this, Mr. ----?"
"I do, my lord," said the advocate.
"Well, it just goes in here and comes out there!" and his lordship smiled with the hilarity of a judge who thinks he has actually said a good thing.
"I do not doubt it, my lord. What is there to prevent it?"
THE SOUND OF A TRUMPET
An old inhabitant of Kilmarnock had taken more whiskey than was good for him. On his way home, feeling very tired, he lay down in the churchyard for a rest, with his head against a tombstone. He was suddenly aroused from his sleep by the blast of a trumpet. He woke in a fright, thinking the end of the world had come, but when he found himself alone, exclaimed, "Well, this is a poor show for Kilmarnock."
GRAMMAR
A waggish curate overheard the schoolmaster giving lessons in grammar.
"You cannot place a, the singular article," said the preceptor, "before plural nouns. No one can say _a_ pigs, _a_ women, _a_----" "Nonsense,"
cried the curate, "the prayerbook teaches us to say _a_-men."
ONE SIDE AT A TIME
A juryman asked to be excused as he was deaf in one ear. "I don"t think that matters," said the judge; "let him be sworn, we only hear one side of a case at a time."
COMPANY
"Bridget, I don"t think it looks well for you to entertain company in the kitchen the way you do," said the young mistress.
"Thanks, mum," replied the cook; "but I wouldn"t like t" take him int"
th" parlour--he spits t"baccy."
HER OWN FAULT
_Mistress_: "Mary, don"t let me catch you kissing the grocer"s boy again."
_Mary_: "Lor", mum, I don"t mean to, but you do bob around so."
A POSER
A new sentry was on guard outside the residence of a general; a small green was in front of the house and the strict orders were that no one was to cross it, human or otherwise, save the General"s cow. An old lady coming to visit, bent her steps across the lawn as a short cut, but was called on by the sentry asking her to return. She was not unnaturally somewhat put out and said, with a stately air, "But do you know who I am?" "I don"t know who you be, ma"am," replied the immovable sentry, "but I knows you b"aint--you b"aint the General"s cow!"
YOUTHFUL PRECOCITY
A youth asked permission of his mother to go to a ball. She told him it was a bad place for little boys. "Why, mother, didn"t you and father use to go to b.a.l.l.s when you were young?" "Yes, but we have seen the folly of it," said the mother. "Well, mother," exclaimed the son, "I want to see the folly of it too!"
ABOVE PROOF