The sences taker in our town being taken sick, he deppertised me to go
out for him one day, and as he was too ill to give me information how
to perceed, I was consekently compelled to go it blind. Sittin’ down
by the roadside I draw’d up the follerin’ list of questions, which I
proposed to ax the people I visited:
Wat’s your age?
Whar’ was you born?
Air you married, and if so, how do you like it?
How many children hav’ you, and do they sufficiently resemble you
so as to proclood the possibility of their belongin’ to any of your
nabers?
Did you ever have the measles, and if so, how many?
Hav’ you a twin brother several years older than yourself?
How many parents have you?
Do you read Watt’s Hymns reg’lar?
Do you use bought’n tabacker?
Wat’s your fitin’ weight?
Air you troubled with biles?
How does your meresham culler?
State whether you air blind, deaf, idiotic, or got the heaves?
Do you know any Opry singers, and if so how much do they owe you?
What’s the average of virtoo in the Ery canawl?
If four barrels of emtin’s pored onto a barn floor will kiver it, how
many plase can Dion Boucicault write in a year?
Is beans a reg’lar article of diet in your family?
How many chickens hav’ you, on foot and in the shell?
Air you aware that Injiany whisky is used in New York shootin’ galrys
insted of pistols, and that it shoots furthest?
Was you ever at Niagry Falls?
Was you ever in the penitentiary?
State how much pork, impendin’ crysis, Dutch cheese, poplar survinity,
standard poetry, children’s strainers, slave code, catnip, red
flannel, ancient history, pickled tomatoes, old junk, perfoomery, coal
ile, liberty, hoopskirts, etc., have you got on hand?
But it didn’t work. I got into a row at the first house I stopt at,
with some old maids. Disbelievin’ the answers they give in regard
to their ages I endeavored to open their mouths and look at their
teeth, same as they do with horses, but they floo into a violent
rage and tackled me with brooms and sich. Takin’ the sences requires
experience, like as any other bizness.
Browne had few if any enemies, and hosts of friends. Everyone with whom
he became acquainted became his friend. He was as genial as he was
humorous, and his former companions who are yet alive look back upon
the time when Artemus Ward, the king of American humorists, took their
proffered hand and shook it warmly in his original and friendly way.