SCAPEGOAT
Cousin Willie, aged ten, came for a visit to Johnnie, aged twelve.
Johnnie"s mother directed him to take the visitor out to play with his boy friends in the neighborhood.
"And be sure to have lots of fun," she added.
On the return of the boys, Willie, the guest, appeared somewhat downcast, but Johnnie was radiant.
"Did you have a good time?" his mother asked.
"Bully!" Johnnie answered.
"And lots of fun?"
"Oh, yes!"
"But Willie doesn"t look very happy," Johnnie"s mother said doubtfully.
"Well, you see," Johnnie answered, beaming, "the rest of us, we had our fun with Willie."
SHEEP AND GOATS
The little girl was deeply impressed by the clergyman"s sermon as to the separation of the sheep and the goats. That night after she had gone to bed, she was heard sobbing, and the mother went to her, to ask what was the matter.
"It"s about the goats!" Jenny confessed at last. "I"m so afraid I am a goat, and so I"ll never go to heaven. Oh, I"m so afraid I"m a goat!"
"My dear," the mother a.s.sured her weeping child. "You"re a sweet little lamb. If you were to die to-night, you would go straight to heaven." Her words were successful in quieting the little girl, and she slept.
But the following night Jenny was found crying again in her bed, and when her mother appeared she wailed:
"I"m afraid about the goats."
"But mother has told you that you are a little lamb, and that you must never worry over being a goat."
Jenny, however, was by no means comforted, and continued her sobs.
"Yes, mamma," she declared sadly, "I know that. But I"m afraid--awful afraid you"re a goat!"
SHIFTLESSNESS
The shiftless man, who preferred reading to labor, closed the book on French history, which he had been perusing with great interest, and addressed his wife.
"Do you know, Mary," he asked impressively, "what I would have done if I had been in Napoleon"s place?"
"Certainly!" the wife snapped. "You"d have settled right down on a farm in Corsica, and let it run itself."
SHIPWRECK
The new member of the club listened with solemn interest to the various stories that were told in the smoking room. They were good stories, and obviously lies, and each of them was a bigger lie than any that had gone before. Finally, the company insisted that the new member should relate a tale. He refused at first, but under pressure yielded, and gave a vivid account of a shipwreck at sea during one of his voyages. He described the stress of the terrible situation with such power that his hearers were deeply impressed. He reached the point in his account where only the captain and himself and half a dozen others were left aboard the doomed vessel, after the last of the boats had been lowered.
"And then," he concluded, "a vast wave came hurtling down on us. It was so huge that it shut out all the sky. It crashed over the already sinking ship in a torrent of irresistible force. Under that dreadful blow the laboring vessel sank, and all those left on board of her were drowned."
The narrator paused and there was a period of tense silence. But presently someone asked:
"And you--what became of you?"
"Oh, I," was the reply, "why I was drowned with the rest of them."
SLANDER
The business man"s wife, who had called at his office, regarded the pretty young stenographer with a baleful eye.
"You told me that your typewriter was an old maid," she accused.
The husband, at a loss, faltered in his reply, but at last contrived:
"Yes, but she"s sick to-day, and sent her grandchild in her place."
SLAVERY
A traveler in the South chatted with an aged negro, whom he met in the road.
"And I suppose you were once a slave?" he remarked.
"Yes, suh," the old colored man answered.
"And, so, after the war, you gained your freedom," the gentleman continued.
But the ancient one shook his head sadly.
"No, suh," he declared with great emphasis. "Not perzactly, suh. I didn"t git mah freedom, suh, after de war--I done got married!"
SMELLS
An argument arose among a number of British officers during their time of service in the Dardanelles, and wagers were made among them. The question at issue was as to which smells the louder, a goat or a Turk.
The colonel was made arbiter. He sat judicially in his tent, and a goat was brought in. The colonel fainted. After the officer had been revived, and was deemed able to continue his duty as referee, a Turk was brought into the tent. The goat fainted.
SOCIAL UPLIFT
The somewhat unpleasant person, who was a social worker, completed her call on a dweller in the tenement district, and rose to depart. The unwilling hostess shook her head at the visitor"s promise to come again.
"And excuse me if I don"t return the call," she vouchsafed. "Myself, I"ve got no time to go slummin"."