The Wit and Humor of America Volume X Part 1

The Wit and Humor of America.

Volume X.

TROUBLE-PROOF[1]

BY EDWIN L. SABIN

Never rains where Jim is-- People kickin', whinin'; He goes round insistin',-- "Sun is _almost_ shinin'!"

Never's hot where Jim is-- When the town is sweatin'; He jes' sets and answers,-- "Well, _I_ ain't a-frettin'!"

Never's cold where Jim is-- None of _us_ mis...o...b.. it, Seein' we're nigh frozen!

_He_ "ain't _thought_ about it!"

Things that rile up others Never seem to strike him!

"Trouble-proof," I call it,-- Wisht that I was like him!

FOOTNOTES:

[1] Lippincott's Magazine.

JOHNNY'S PA

BY WILBUR D. NESBIT

My pa--he always went to school, He says, an' studied hard.

W'y, when he's just as big as me He knew things by the yard!

Arithmetic? He knew it all From dividend to sum; But when he tells me how it was, My grandma, she says "Hum!"

My pa--he always got the prize For never bein' late; An' when they studied joggerfy He knew 'bout every state.

He says he knew the rivers, an'

Knew all their outs an' ins; But when he tells me all o' that, My grandma, she just grins.

My pa, he never missed a day A-goin' to the school, An' never played no hookey, nor Forgot the teacher's rule; An' every cla.s.s he's ever in, The rest he always led.

My grandma, when pa talks that way, Just laughs an' shakes her head.

My grandma says 'at boys is boys, The same as pas is pas, An' when I ast her what she means She says it is "because."

She says 'at little boys is best When they grows up to men, Because they know how good they was, An' tell their children, then!

MAXIMS

BY BENJAMIN FRANKLIN

Never spare the parson's wine, nor the baker's pudding.

A house without woman or firelight is like a body without soul or spirit.

Kings and bears often worry their keepers.

Light purse, heavy heart.

He's a fool that makes his doctor his heir.

Ne'er take a wife till thou hast a house (and a fire) to put her in.

To lengthen thy life, lessen thy meals.

He that drinks fast pays slow.

He is ill-clothed who is bare of virtue.

Beware of meat twice boil'd, and an old foe reconcil'd.

The heart of a fool is in his mouth, but the mouth of a wise man is in his heart.

He that is rich need not live sparingly, and he that can live sparingly need not be rich.

He that waits upon fortune is never sure of a dinner.

NEVADA SKETCHES

BY SAMUEL L. CLEMENS

IN CARSON CITY

I feel very much as if I had just awakened out of a long sleep. I attribute it to the fact that I have slept the greater part of the time for the last two days and nights. On Wednesday, I sat up all night, in Virginia, in order to be up early enough to take the five o'clock stage on Thursday morning. I was on time. It was a great success. I had a cheerful trip down to Carson, in company with that incessant talker, Joseph T. Goodman. I never saw him flooded with such a flow of spirits before. He restrained his conversation, though, until we had traveled three or four miles, and were just crossing the divide between Silver City and Spring Valley, when he thrust his head out of the dark stage, and allowed a pallid light from the coach lamps to illuminate his features for a moment, after which he returned to darkness again, and sighed and said, "d.a.m.n it!" with some asperity. I asked him who he meant it for, and he said, "The weather out there." As we approached Carson, at about half past seven o'clock, he thrust his head out again, and gazed earnestly in the direction of that city--after which he took it in again, with his nose very much frosted. He propped the end of that organ upon the end of his finger, and looked pensively upon it--which had the effect of making him cross-eyed--and remarked, "O, d.a.m.n it!" with great bitterness. I asked him what was up this time, and he said, "The cold, damp fog--it is worse than the weather." This was his last. He never spoke again in my hearing. He went on over the mountains with a lady fellow pa.s.senger from here. That will stop his chatter, you know, for he seldom speaks in the presence of ladies.

In the evening I felt a mighty inclination to go to a party somewhere.

There was to be one at Governor J. Neely Johnson's, and I went there and asked permission to stand around a while. This was granted in the most hospitable manner, and the vision of plain quadrilles soothed my weary soul. I felt particularly comfortable, for if there is one thing more grateful to my feelings than another, it is a new house--a large house, with its ceilings embellished with snowy mouldings; its floors glowing with warm-tinted carpets, with cushioned chairs and sofas to sit on, and a piano to listen to; with fires so arranged you can see them, and know there is no humbug about it; with walls garnished with pictures, and above all mirrors, wherein you may gaze and always find something to admire, you know. I have a great regard for a good house, and a girlish pa.s.sion for mirrors. Horace Smith, Esq., is also very fond of mirrors.

He came and looked in the gla.s.s for an hour with me. Finally it cracked--the night was pretty cold--and Horace Smith's reflection was split right down the centre. But where his face had been the damage was greatest--a hundred cracks converged to his reflected nose, like spokes from the hub of a wagon wheel. It was the strangest freak the weather has done this winter. And yet the parlor seemed warm and comfortable, too.

About nine o'clock the Unreliable came and asked Gov. Johnson to let him stand on the porch. The creature has got more impudence than any person I ever saw in my life. Well, he stood and flattened his nose against the parlor window, and looked hungry and vicious--he always looks that way--until Colonel Musser arrived with some ladies, when he actually fell in their wake and came swaggering in looking as if he thought he had been anxiously expected. He had on my fine kid boots, my plug hat, my white kid gloves (with slices of his prodigious hands grinning through the bursted seams), and my heavy gold repeater, which I had been offered thousands and thousands of dollars for many and many a time. He took those articles out of my trunk, at Washoe City, about a month ago, when we went there to report the proceedings of the convention. The Unreliable intruded himself upon me in his cordial way, and said, "How are you, Mark, old boy? When d'you come down? It's brilliant, ain't it?

Appear to enjoy themselves, don't they? Lend a fellow two bits, can't you?" He always winds up his remarks that way. He appears to have an insatiable craving for two bits.

The music struck up just then and saved me. The next moment I was far, far at sea in the plain quadrille. We carried it through with distinguished success; that is, we got as far as "balance around" and "half-a-man-left," when I smelled hot whisky punch, or something of that nature. I tracked the scent through several rooms, and finally discovered a large bowl from which it emanated. I found the omnipresent Unreliable there, also. He set down an empty goblet and remarked that he was diligently seeking the gentlemen's dressing room. I would have shown him where it was, but it occurred to him that the supper table and the punch bowl ought not to be left unprotected; wherefore we stayed there and watched them until the punch entirely evaporated. A servant came in then, to replenish the bowl, and we left the refreshments in his charge.

We probably did wrong, but we were anxious to join the hazy dance. The dance was hazier than usual, after that. Sixteen couples on the floor at once, with a few dozen spectators scattered around, is calculated to have its effect in a brilliantly lighted parlor, I believe. Everything seemed to buzz, at any rate. After all the modern dances had been danced several times, the people adjourned to the supper-room. I found my wardrobe out there, as usual, with the Unreliable in it. His old distemper was upon him: he was desperately hungry. I never saw a man eat as much as he did in my life. I have various items of his supper here in my note-book. First, he ate a plate of sandwiches; then he ate a handsomely iced poundcake; then he gobbled a dish of chicken salad; after which he ate a roast pig; after that, a quant.i.ty of blanc-mange; then he threw in several dozen gla.s.ses of punch to fortify his appet.i.te, and finished his monstrous repast with a roast turkey. Dishes of brandy-grapes, and jellies, and such things, and pyramids of fruits melted away before him as shadows fly at the sun's approach. I am of the opinion that none of his ancestors were present when the five thousand were miraculously fed in the old Scriptural times. I base my opinion on the twelve bushels of sc.r.a.ps and the little fishes that remained over after that feast. If the Unreliable himself had been there, the provisions would just about have held out, I think.