It chanced that the minister came along. Going up to Moses, he demanded harshly, "Moses, do you know the Ten Commandments?"
Moses scratched his chin for a moment, and then, in an equally harsh voice, said:
"Parson, yo" don"t think yo" kin beat me do yo"? Jest yo" whistle the first three or four bars, an" I"ll have a try at it."--_Harper"s_.
One day Miss Maria Thompson Daviess, the author, walked down a street in Nashville. The street was crowded with Negroes, who were forming in a line for a parade.
"What"s the occasion for the parade, Tom?" she asked of a boy.
The boy looked at her with a grin.
"La, Miss Daviess," he replied, "don" you-all know colored folks well "nough to know dat dey don" need no "casion foh a p"rade?"
An old doctor was making a call on a colored family. While talking to the patient he was continually interrupted by a crying baby, which sat on the floor and grumbled and whined continually. Finally, the mother picked the child up.
"Auntie," said the doctor, "your baby seems badly spoiled."
"No, suh! No, suh!" remonstrated the mother. "All little cullud babies smell dat way!"
_See also_ Chicken stealing.
NEIGHBORS
"But I don"t know you, madam," the bank cashier said to the woman who had presented a check.
The woman, however, instead of saying haughtily, "I do not wish your acquaintance, sir," merely replied, with an engaging smile:
"Oh, yes, you do, I think. I"m the "red-headed old virago" next door to you, whose scoundrelly little boys are always reaching through the fence and picking your flowers. When you started for town this morning your wife said: "Now, Henry, if you want a dinner fit to eat this evening you"ll have to leave me a little money. I can"t keep this house on plain water and sixpence a day.""
Christianity teaches us to love our neighbor as ourself; modern society acknowledges no neighbor.--_Beaconsfield_.
"I"m quite a near neighbor of yours now," said Mr. Bore.
"I"m living just across the river."
"Indeed," replied Miss Smart. "I hope you"ll drop in some day."
NEW JERSEY
Misunderstandings with New Jersey people are sure to result if visitors mistake chicken wire for mosquito netting.
NEW YORK CITY
Mr. Edmund Hornung was in New York several days over Sunday.
That"s where they travel fast, I"m telling you.
SILAS (in a whisper)--"Did you git a peep at the underworld at all while you wuz in New York, Ezry?"
EZRA--"Three times! Subway twice an" ratscellar once."
"I see New York did considerable begging for one of those reserve banks."
"What of it?"
"Oh, nothing, New York used to dictate."
CUBIST TEACHER--"Can anyone give an impressionistic definition of New York?"
BRIGHT PUPIL--"A small body of limousines almost entirely surrounded by Fords."
FIRST SOUTHERNER--"Were you in New York long enough to feel at home?"
SECOND SOUTHERNER--"Yes, sir; why, I got so I could keep my seat in the cars with a lady standing and not even think about it."
An Ohio newspaper editor spent a few days in New York, and while there somebody asked him how he liked the big town.
"I care for it very little," replied the editor. "Did you ever think of this: Suppose you lived in New York and wanted to go fishing. Where would you go to dig a can of worms?"
"I hear you want a room clerk."
"No, we never have any rooms. What we want is a clerk who can satisfy people in a.s.signing them to billiard tables, telephone booths and cots in the halls."
The surging crowd along Broadway Was stirred so strangely yesterday.