"Well, sah, He done axed me what chu"ch Ah wanted to jine, an" Ah tole Him it was yourn. An" He says: "Ho, ho, dat chu"ch!" says he. "You can"t git in dere. Ah know you can"t--"cause Ah been tryin" to git in dat chu"ch fer ten years mahself an" Ah couldn"t!""
EXPECTANCY
An Irishman on a scaffolding four stories high heard the noon whistle.
But when he would have descended, he found that the ladder had been removed. One of his fellow workmen on the pavement below, to whom he called, explained that the foreman had carried off the ladder for another job.
"But how"ll I get down?" Pat demanded.
Mike, on the pavement, suggested jumping as the only means. Pat"s lunch was below, he was hungry, and he accepted the suggestion seriously.
"Will yez kitch me?" he demanded.
"Sure, an" I"ll do that," Mike agreed.
Pat clapped his arms in imitation of a rooster, and crowed, to bolster up his courage, and leaped. He regained consciousness after a short interval, and feebly sat up on the pavement. He regarded Mike reproachfully.
"For why did yez not kitch me?" he asked, and the pain in bones sounded in his voice.
"Begorry," Mike replied sympathetically, "I was waiting for yez to bounce!"
EXPENSE ACCOUNT
The woman wrote a reference for her discharged cook as follows:
"Maggie Flynn has been employed by me for a month. She is an excellent cook, but I could not afford to make use of her services longer."
The husband, who was present, afterward expressed his surprise at the final clause.
"But it"s true," the wife answered. "The dishes she smashed cost double her wages."
EXPERIENCE
The baby pulled brother"s hair until he yelled from the pain of it. The mother soothed the weeping boy:
"Of course, she doesn"t know how badly it hurts." Then she left the room.
She hurried back presently on hearing frantic squalling from baby.
"What in the world is the matter with her?" she questioned anxiously.
"Nothin" "tall," brother replied contentedly. "Only now she knows."
EXPERTS
There was a chicken-stealing case before the court. The colored culprit pleaded guilty and was duly sentenced. But the circ.u.mstances of the case had provoked the curiosity of the judge, so that he questioned the darky as to how he had managed to take those chickens and carry them off from right under the window of the owner"s house, and that with a savage dog loose in the yard. But the thief was not minded to explain. He said:
"Hit wouldn"t be of no use, jedge, to try to "splain dis ting to you-all. Ef you was to try it you more"n like as not would git yer hide full o" shot an" git no chickens, nuther. Ef you want to engage in any rascality, jedge, you better stick to de bench, whar you am familiar."
EXPLICITNESS
On her return home after an absence of a few hours, the mother was displeased to find that little Emma, who was ailing, had not taken her pill at the appointed time, although she had been carefully directed to do so.
"You were very naughty, Emma," the mother chided. "I told you to be sure and take that pill."
"But, mamma," the child pleaded in extenuation, "you didn"t tell me where to take it to."
EXTRAVAGANCE
A rich and listless lady patron examined the handbags in a leading jeweler"s shop in New York City. The clerk exhibited one bag five inches square, made of platinum and with one side almost covered with a setting of diamonds. This was offered at a price of $9,000.
But the lady surveyed the expensive bauble without enthusiasm. She turned it from side to side and over and over, regarding it with a critical eye and frowning disapprovingly. At last she voiced her comment:
"Rather pretty, but I don"t like this side without diamonds. Honestly, the thing looks skimpy--decidedly skimpy!"
For $7,000 additional, the objectional skimpiness was corrected.
FACTS
The burly man spoke lucidly to his gangling adversary:
"You"re a nincomp.o.o.p, a liar and hoss-thief."
The other man protested, with a whine in his voice:
"Sech talk ain"t nice--and, anyhow, "tain"t fair twittin" on facts."
FASHION
After years of endeavor in poverty, the inventor made a success, and came running home with pockets bulging real money. He joyously strewed thousand-dollar bills in his wife"s lap, crying:
"Now, at last, my dear, you will be able to buy you some decent clothes."
"I"ll do nothing of the kind," was the sharp retort. "I"ll get the same kind the other women are wearing."
"The naked hills lie wanton to the breeze, "The fields are nude, the groves unfrocked, "Bare are the shivering limbs of shameless trees, "What wonder is it that the corn is shocked?"
But not the modern woman!