Quips and Quiddities Part 11

Some say that the primitive tongue Expressed but the simplest affections; And swear that the words said or sung Were nothing but mere interjections.

_Oh! Oh!_ was the signal of pain; _Ha! Ha!_ was the symptom of laughter; _Pooh! Pooh!_ was the sign of disdain, And _Hillo!_ came following after.

Some, taking a different view, Maintain the old language was fitted To mark out the objects we knew, By mimicking sounds they emitted.

_Bow, wow_, was the name of a dog, _Quack, quack_, was the word for a duckling, _Hunc, hunc_, would designate a hog, And _wee, wee_, a pig and a suckling.

LORD NEAVES, _Songs and Verses_.

_A PRACTICAL MAN._--One whose judgment is not distracted by the power of seeing far before him.

ANNE EVANS, _Poems and Music_.

For conversation well endued, She thinks it witty to be rude, And, placing raillery in railing, Proclaims aloud your greatest failing.

SWIFT, _A Woman's Mind_.

I have always been more or less mixed up with Art. I have an uncle who takes photographs--and I have a servant who takes anything he can get his hands on.

C. F. BROWNE, _Artemus Ward's Lecture_.

If a man who turnips cries Cry not when his father dies, 'Tis a proof that he would rather Have a turnip than a father.

DR. JOHNSON.

The greatest happiness of the greatest number is best secured by a prudent consideration for Number One.

_Kenelm Chillingly_, in LORD LYTTON's novel.

"You are old, Father William," the young man said, "And your hair has become very white; And yet you incessantly stand on your head-- Do you think, at your age, it is right?"

"In my youth," Father William replied to his son, "I feared it might injure my brain; But now that I'm perfectly sure I have none, Why, I do it again and again."

LEWIS CARROLL, _Alice in Wonderland_.

When the question arose how the t.i.tle of Herold's charming opera, "Le Pre aux Clercs," should be rendered into English, [Beazley] quietly suggested "Parson's Green."

J. R. PLANCHe, _Recollections_.

When I left the man in gaiters, He was grumbling, o'er his gin, At the charges of the hostess Of that famous Flemish inn; And he looked a very Briton (So, methinks, I see him still) As he pocketed the candle That was mentioned in the bill!

JOHN G.o.dFREY SAXE, _Poems_.

Morality--keeping up appearances in this world, or becoming suddenly devout when we imagine that we may be shortly summoned to appear in the next.

HORACE SMITH, _The Tin Trumpet_.

_ON PATRONS' PROMISES._

A minister's answer is always so kind!

I starve, and he tells me he'll keep me in mind.

Half his promise, G.o.d knows, would my spirits restore-- Let him keep me, and, faith, I will ask for no more.

LORD HOLLAND, in MOORE's _Diary_.

I know there's a stage of speculation in which a man may doubt whether a pickpocket is blameworthy--but I'm not one of your subtle fellows who keep looking at the world through their own legs.

_Felix Holt_, in GEORGE ELIOT's novel.

"A knock-me-down sermon, and worthy of Birch,"

Says I to my wife, as we toddle from church.

"Convincing, indeed!" is the lady's remark; "How logical, too, on the size of the Ark!"

Then Blossom cut in, without begging our pardons, "Pa, was it as big as the 'Logical Gardens?"

"Miss Blossom," says I, to my dearest of dearies, "Papa disapproves of nonsensical queries; The Ark was an Ark, and had people to build it, Enough we are told Noah built it and fill'd it: Mamma does not ask how he caught his opossums."

--Said she, "That remark is as foolish as Blossom's!"

FREDERICK LOCKER, _London Lyrics_.

Books are fatal: they are the curse of the human race. Nine-tenths of existing books are nonsense, and the clever books are the refutation of that nonsense. The greatest misfortune that ever befell man was the invention of printing.

Phoebus, in LORD BEACONSFIELD's _Lothair_.

We can't a.s.sume, so Comte declares, a first or final cause, sir; Phenomena are all we know, their order and their laws, sir; While Hegel's modest formula, a single line to sum in, Is "Nothing is, and nothing's not, but everything's becomin'."

F. D., in _Pall Mall Gazette_.

If you wish particularly to gain the good graces and affection of certain people, men or women, try to discover their most striking merit, if they have one, and their dominant weakness, for every one has his own. Then do justice to the one, and a little more than justice to the other.

LORD CHESTERFIELD, _Letters to his Son_.

Tender ten may dote on toys, While for twelve jam tarts have joys, Feat fourteen's in love with boys-- Not a few.

J. ASHBY STERRY, _Boudoir Ballads_.