that that you preached?" "No, sir; I held the light for a man what did."
"Ah; the court understood you differently. They supposed that the
discourse came from you." "No, sir; I only throwed a light on it." "No
levity, Mr. Smith. Crier, wipe your nose, and call on the next witness."
Mrs. Hopkins told me, that she heard Green's wife say, that John Glucks
told her, that Fanny Hopkins heard the Widow Busham say, that Captain
Weed's wife thought Colonel Hodgkins' sisters believed, that old Miss
Quint reckoned that Mrs. Samuel Dunham had told Spoldin's wife that she
heard John Fink's daughter say, that her mother told her, that old Miss
Jenks heard Grandmother Cook declare, that it was an undoubted fact.
"Misther! Misther! what have you done?" said a little fellow with
protruding eyes, to a greenhorn, who had just tied his horse to a spruce
pole, as he thought, on the street. "Done!" said the fellow, "what do
you mean? I haint been doin' nothin' as I knows on!" "Why, yeth you
have, thir; you've hitched your hoth to the magnetic telegraph, and
you'll be in Bothton in leth than two minutes, if you don't look out!"
The man untied his horse with nervous anxiety, and, jumping into his
wagon, drove hastily down the street.
"I'm not afraid of a barrel of cider!" said a toper to a temperance man.
"I presume not, from your appearance; I should think a barrel of cider
would _run_ at your approach," was the reply.
"I tell you, Susan, that I will commit suicide, if you won't have
me."--"Well, John, as soon as you have given me that proof of your
affection, I will believe that you love me."
If the speculator misses his aim, everybody cries out, "He's a fool,"
and sometimes "He's a rogue." If he succeeds, they besiege his door and
demand his daughter in marriage.
"I'm sitting on the style, Mary," as the lover said when he seated
himself on a bonnet of the latest Paris fashion.
"If you say another crooked word I'll knock your brains out," said a
blacksmith to his termagant wife. "Ram's horns, you dog!" exclaimed his
hopeful helpmate, "ram's horns, if I die for it!"
It is said there is a man in Connecticut who walks so fast, that it puts
his shadow out of breath to keep up with him.
In the course of the Irish state trial, Mr. Whiteside quoted an
extraordinary figure once used by an advocate: "I smell a rat--I see it
brewing in the storm--and I will crush it in the bud!"
"I say, Pat, what are you writing there in such a large hand?" "Array,
honey, an' isn't it to my poor mother, who is very deaf, that I'm
writing a loud letther?"
I think it is a very foolish thing for any man to become a _sleeping_
partner, because he may _awake_ and find himself in the Gazette.
"Dad," said an incipient legislator to his indulgent parent, who had
gratified him with a visit to the galleries of the capital, "say do you
see any row going on? I don't." "No," said the astonished father, "of
course not. Why did you ask?" "Cause the man in the big desk says--'the
_eyes_ have it!'--and just now he said the _nose_ had it--so I thought
there was some _fun_ down there some'ers!"
During a learned lecture by a German adventurer, one Baron
Vondullbrains, he illustrated the glory of mechanics, as a science,
thus:--"De t'ing dat is _made_ is more superior dan de _maker_, I shall
show you how in some t'ings. Suppose I make de round wheel of de coach?
Ver' well; dat wheel roll round five hundred mile!--and I cannot roll
one myself! Suppose I am a cooper, what you call, and I make de big tub
to hold wine? He hold tons and gallons; and _I cannot hold more dan five
bottle_! So you see dat what is made is more superior dan de maker."
"Doctor, that ere ratsbane of yourn is fust rate," said a Yankee to a
village apothecary.--"Know'd it," said the pleased vendor of drugs.
"Don't keep nothing but first-rate doctor's stuff."--"And, doctor," said
the joker, coolly, "I want to buy another pound of ye."--"Another
pound?"--"Yes, sir; I gin that pound I bought the other day to a
nibbling mouse, and it made him dreadful sick, and I am sure another
pound would kill him!"
Drunken Davy, after spending his day's earnings at a grocery, set out
for home. "Well," says he, "if I find my wife up, I'll kick her--what
business has she to sit up, wasting fire and light, eh? And if I find
her in bed, I'll kick her--what business has she to go to bed before I
get home?"
Transcriber's Notes:
Italics are represented with _underscores_.
Replaced oe ligature with oe (e.g. Manoeuver); ligatures are retained in
HTML edition.
Page 5, added missing period.
Page 7, changed single to double quote after "you'll have a good time."
Page 13, changed "Blatter" to "Blätter" for consistency; corrected "eat
their meals" to "ate their meals."
Page 17, removed stray quote after "winnowing."
Page 28, added missing open quote to first sentence of "Certainly."
Changed "Doodle" to "Doddle."
Page 33, added missing quote after "Well, what ails your town this
year?"
Page 35, changed "mawrnin,'" to "mawrnin',"
Page 38, changed double quote to single quote after "Do you have to wear
that when you are seeking religion?" and changed question mark to
exclamation point in "Yes, Marse Thompson!"
Page 46, added missing comma after "Tennessee."
Page 66, changed comma to period after "recoiling."
Page 67, added missing period to first sentence.
Page 69, changed "its mighty risky" to "it's mighty risky."
Page 80, changed "hay mow" to "haymow" for consistency.
Page 93, changed "fonnd" to "found."
Page 94, changed "explaimed" to "explained."
Page 109, added missing quote after "dat mule."
Page 110, due to a flaw in the original book, the Chief's name in the
photo caption is partially illegible. The name presented here is a best
guess (there was a General Superintendant George W. Hubbard in Chicago
from 1888 to 1890).
Page 114, added missing period after "sez he."
Page 122, added missing "this" to "that this is a hot day" and changed
"someting" to "something."
Page 123, added missing italics around "bier."
Page 126, changed ! to ? in "do you mean by that that you preached?"
The last six pages of this book come from "The Journal of Solomon
Sidesplitter," which is a whole book in its own right. It is unclear
whether this is an intentional excerpt or a printer's error.