Dr. Lyman P. Powell gives some examples of the lengths to which petty bitterness between sects will sometimes carry men. "A visitor in a certain town which had four churches and adequately supported none, asked a pillar of one poor dying church, "How"s your church getting on?" "Not very well," was the reply, "but, thank the Lord, the others are not doing any better.""
REMEDIES
A Chinaman was asked if there were good doctors in China.
"Good doctors!" he exclaimed, "China have best doctors in world. Hang Chang one good doctor; he great; save life, to me."
"You don"t say so! How was that?"
"Me velly bad," he said. "Me callee Doctor Han Kon. Give some medicine. Get velly, velly ill. Me callee Doctor San Sing. Give more medicine. Me glow worse--go die. Blimebly callee Doctor Hang Chang. He got no time; no come. Save life."
The other day a negro went into a drug store and said:
"Ah wants one ob dem dere plasters you stick on yoah back."
"I understand," said the clerk, "You mean one of our porous plasters?"
"No, sab, I don"t want none ob your porous plasters, I wants de bes"
one you got."
A Swedish farmer, who lived on his wheat farm in Minnesota, was taken ill and his wife telephoned the doctor.
"If you have a thermometer," answered the physician, "take his temperature. I will be out and see him presently."
An hour or so later when the doctor drove up, the woman met him at the door.
"How is he?" asked the doctor.
"Veil," said she, "I bane put the barometer on him like you tell me, and it say "Very dry," so I give him a pitcher of water to drink, and now he ban gone back to vork."
BESSIE--"The doctor says mamma must take a const.i.tutional every morning. What"s that mean?"
BOBBY--"That means walking."
BESSIE--"Then why didn"t he say walk?"
BOBBY--"I don"t know, but I guess maybe if he called it that he couldn"t charge for it."
REMINDERS
HE (to wife who is off for the beach)--"Now, don"t forget me, dear."
SHE--"As if I could, Jack. The surf at night sounds just like you snoring."
The late Horace Hutton used to say that having to take a little trouble would impress a fact on any one"s memory so that he would never be able to forget it. In ill.u.s.tration he would tell this story:
"Our waitress, Maggie, could never remember to put salt on the table, and time after time Mrs. Hutton would remind her to do it. One morning it was absent, as usual, and I said, "Maggie, where is the stepladder?"
""It"s in the pantry, sir!"
""Please bring it in, Maggie," I said kindly.
"Maggie brought it in with a look of wonder on her face.
""Put it right beside the table," I commanded, and when she had done so I added: "Now, I want you to climb up to the top of it, look all over the table and see if there is any salt there."
"Maggie never forgot the salt again."
"What"s that piece of cord tied around your finger for?"
"My wife put it there to remind me to post a letter."
"And did you post it?"
"No; she forgot to give it to me."
CONDUCTOR--"Do you mind if I put your bag out of the way, sir? People coming in are falling over it."
TRAVELER--"You leave it where it is. If n.o.body falls over it I shall forget it"s there."
REPARTEE
"Pa, what is repartee?"
"Oh, merely an insult with its dress-suit on, my son."--_Puck_.
FIRST STUDENT--"The idea; my napkin is damp!"
SECOND STUDENT--"Perhaps that"s because there is so much due on your board."