Part 3

Poor relations are undeniably irritating--their existence is so entirely uncalled for on our part, and they are almost always very faulty people.

GEORGE ELIOT, _Mill on the Floss_.

There was an APE in the days that were earlier; Centuries passed, and his hair became curlier: Centuries more gave a thumb to his wrist-- Then he was MAN, and a Positivist.

MORTIMER COLLINS, _The British Birds_.

It was observed he never gave an opinion on any subject, and never told an anecdote. Indeed, he would sometimes remark, when a man fell into his anecdotage it was a sign for him to retire from the world.

LORD BEACONSFIELD, _Lothair_.

You cannot eat breakfast all day, Nor is it the act of a sinner, When breakfast is taken away, To turn your attention to dinner; And it's not in the range of belief, That you could hold him as a glutton, Who, when he is tired of beef, Determines to tackle the mutton.

_Defendant_, in W. S. GILBERT's _Trial by Jury_.

Had the Romans public dinners? Answer me that. Imagine a Roman--whose theory at least of a dinner was that it was a thing for enjoyment, whereas we often look on it as a continuation of the business of the day,--I say, imagine a Roman girding himself up, literally girding himself up, to make an after dinner speech.

_Ellesmere_, in HELPS's _Friends in Council_.

Folks will teach you when at school-- "Never tell a lie!" Nonsense: if you're not a fool You may always break the rule, But you must be sly; For they'll whip you, past a doubt, If they ever find you out.

Folks say, "Children should not let Angry passions rise." Humbug! When you're in a pet Why on earth should you regret Blacking some one's eyes? Children's eyes are made, in fact, Just on purpose to be black'd.

H. S. LEIGH, _Carols of Cockayne_.

It is not now "We have seen his star in the East," but "We have seen the star on his breast, and are come to worship him."

SHENSTONE, _Essays_.

_A FAITHFUL PAGE._

Nearly one hundred years ago, my grandfather, Captain William Locker, was at dinner, and a servant-boy, lately engaged, was handing him a tray of liqueurs, in different-sized glasses. Being in the middle of an anecdote to his neighbour, he mechanically held out his hand towards the tray, but, as people often do when they are thinking of something else, he did not take a glass. The boy thought he was hesitating which liqueur he would have, and, like a good fellow, wishing to help his master, he pointed to one particular glass, and whispered, "That's the biggest, sir."

FREDERICK LOCKER, _Patchwork_.

All men are equal, the Frenchman says; Most men will gladly receive What a fervid fool, with a flattering phrase, Tricks out for fools to believe; But these men have less brains than a wren! When a larch is a lily, And Bessy like Billy A beard shall achieve, Then I will believe That equality reigns among men!

J. S. BLACKIE, _Musa Burschicosa_.

I'm not one o' those who can see the cat i' the dairy, an' wonder what she's come after.

_Mrs. Poyser_, in GEORGE ELIOT's _Adam Bede_.

I called him Selim, to express The marked s(e)limness of his form.

_Songs of Singularity._

"Yes," he exclaimed, "as the sublime Tyndall tells us, let us struggle to attain to a deeper knowledge of matter, and a more faithful conformity to its laws!"

The professor would have proceeded, but the weather had been rapidly growing rough, and he here became violently sea-sick.

"Let us," he exclaimed hurriedly, "conform to the laws of matter and go below."

W. H. MALLOCK, _The New Paul and Virginia_.

What can Tommy Onslow do? He can drive a curricle and two. Can Tommy Onslow do no more? Yes, he can drive a phaeton and four.

ANON., in GRONOW's _Recollections_.

Hicks and Thackeray, walking together, stopped opposite a doorway, over which was inscribed in gold letters these words: "Mutual Loan Office." They both seemed equally puzzled. "What on earth can that mean?" asked Hicks. "I don't know," answered Thackeray, "unless it means, that two men, who have nothing, agree to lend it to one another."

J. C. YOUNG, _Diary_.

A clod--a piece of orange-peel-- An end of a cigar,-- Once trod on by a princely heel, How beautiful they are!

C. S. CALVERLEY, _Fly Leaves_.

In the onion is the hope of universal brotherhood. Look at Italy. In the churches all are alike; there is one faith, one smell.

C. D. WARNER, _My Summer in a Garden_.

He was "free to confess" (whence comes this phrase? Is't English? No--'tis only parliamentary).

LORD BYRON, _Don Juan_.

"Ah!" says my languid Oxford gentleman, "nothing new, and nothing true, and no matter."

R. W. EMERSON.

He dropt a tear on Susan's bier, He seem'd a most despairing swain; Yet bluer sky brought newer tie, And would he wish her back again? The moments fly, and when we die Will Philly Thistletop complain? She'll cry and sigh, and--dry her eye, And let herself be woo'd again.

FREDERICK LOCKER, _London Lyrics_.

One 'ud think, an hear some folks talk, as the men war 'cute enough to count the corns in a bag o' wheat wi' only smelling at it. They can see through a barn door, they can. Perhaps that's the reason they see so little o' this side on't.

_Mrs. Poyser_, in GEORGE ELIOT's _Adam Bede_.

Thy flattering picture, Phryne, 's like to thee Only in this--that you both painted be.

JOHN DONNE.

Without black velvet breeches, what is man?

JOHN BRAMSTON, _Man of Taste_.

_A KISS._

Rose kissed me to-day,-- Will she kiss me to-morrow? Let it be as it may, Rose kissed me to-day. But the pleasure gives way To a savour of sorrow;-- Rose kissed me to-day,-- _Will_ she kiss me to-morrow?

AUSTIN DOBSON, _Proverbs in Porcelain_.

Humility is a virtue all preach, none practise, and yet everybody is content to hear.

SELDEN, _Table Talk_.

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 title of Herold's charming opera, "Le Pré aux Clercs," should be rendered into English, [Beazley] quietly suggested "Parson's Green."

J. R. PLANCHÉ, _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 GODFREY 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, God 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 assume, 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_.

Juliet was a fool to kill herself. In three months she'd have married again, and been glad to be quit of Romeo.

CHARLES BUXTON, _Notes of Thought_.

A cornet waltzes, but a colonel weds.

ALFRED AUSTIN, _The Season_.

In the days when Pam retained the wheel, We knew the men with whom we had to deal; Then sucking statesmen seldom failed in seeing The final cause and import of their being. They dressed; they drove a drag; nor sought to shirk Their portion of the matrimonial work. They flocked to rout and drum by tens and twelves; Danced every dance, and left their cards themselves, While some obliging senatorial fag Slipped their petitions in the Speaker's bag.

_Lady Matilda_, in G. O. TREVELYAN's _Ladies in Parliament_.

Monk Lewis was a great favourite at Oatlands. One day after dinner, as the duchess was leaving the room, she whispered something in Lewis's ear. He was much affected, his eyes filling with tears. We asked him what was the matter. "Oh," replied Lewis, "the duchess spoke so _very_ kindly to me!" "My dear fellow," said Colonel Armstrong, "pray don't cry; I dare say she didn't mean it."

ROGERS, _Table Talk_.

Sweet is revenge--especially to women.

LORD BYRON, _Don Juan_.

A plain leg of mutton, my Lucy, I prithee get ready at three; Have it smoking and tender and juicy, And what better meat can there be?

And when it has feasted the master, 'Twill amply suffice for the maid; Meanwhile, I will smoke my canaster, And tipple my ale in the shade.

W. M. THACKERAY.

L'amour est comme les maladies épidémiques; plus on les craint, plus on y est exposé.

CHAMFORT, _Maximes_.

_MARRY_ (_AND_ DON'T) _COME UP_.

A fellow that's single, a fine fellow's he; But a fellow that's married's a _felo de se_.

SHIRLEY BROOKS, _Wit and Humour_.

A brother actor, who had not exactly "taken the house by storm" at his first appearance in London, very stupidly asked Compton: "Was my acting good?" "Well," was the reply, delivered in his inimitable style, "hum! ha! _Good_ is not the word!"

H. HOWE, in _Memoir of Henry Compton_.

So when two dogs are fighting in the streets, When a third dog one of the two dogs meets, With angry tooth he bites him to the bone, And this dog smarts for what that dog has done.

FIELDING, _Tom Thumb_.

I recollect a humorous M.P. pointing out to me a retired West Indian judge not very remarkable for sagacity on the bench. There was a ball at Government House, and the judge began to criticise the dancing of a witty member of the Indian bar. "Ah, my friend, you are a bad waltzer!" "Ah, but you are a bad judge."

MARK BOYD, _Reminiscences_.

_Mrs. Cripps_: Things are seldom what they seem: Skim milk masquerades as cream; Highlows pass as patent leathers; Jackdaws strut in peacocks' feathers.

_Captain_: Very true, So they do.

_Mrs. Cripps_: Black sheep dwell in every fold; All that glitters is not gold; Storks turn out to be but logs; Bulls are but inflated frogs.

_Captain_: So they be, Frequentlee.

W. S. GILBERT, _H.M.S. Pinafore_.

A friend meeting Sir George Rose one day in Lincoln's Inn Fields, with his left eye greatly swollen and inflamed, remonstrated with him, adding that he was surprised Lady Rose should have let him go out of doors in such a condition. "Ah," replied Sir George, "I am out _jure mariti_" (my right eye).

_Macmillan's Magazine._

It is no comfort to the _short_ To know you cannot love _at all_!

ROBERT REECE, in _Comic Poets_.

"Edwin and Morcar, the Earls of Mercia and Northumbria, declared for him; and even Stigand, the patriotic Archbishop of Canterbury, found it advisable----" "Found _what?_" said the Duck. "Found _it_," the Mouse replied, rather crossly; "of course you know what 'it' means." "I know what 'it' means well enough, when _I_ find a thing," said the Duck; "it's generally a frog or a worm. The question is, what did the archbishop find?"

LEWIS CARROLL, _Alice in Wonderland_.

I've read in many a novel, that, unless they've souls that grovel, Folks _prefer_, in fact, a hovel to your dreary marble halls.

C. S. CALVERLEY, _Fly Leaves_.

Marriage is a Bishop, choral service, Messrs. Hancock, and Brussels lace.

ANNA C. STEELE.

How beautifully blue the sky, The glass is rising very high, Continue fine I hope it may, And yet it rained but yesterday; To-morrow it may pour again (I hear the country wants some rain); Yet people say, I know not why, That we shall have a warm July.

W. S. GILBERT, _Pirates of Penzance_.

The Dowager-Duchess of Richmond went one Sunday with her daughter to the Chapel Royal at St. James's, but, being late, they could find no places. After looking about some time, and seeing the case was hopeless, she said to her daughter, "Come away, Louisa; at any rate we have done the civil thing."

R. R. HAYDON, _Diary_.

_ON NORTHERN LIGHTS._

To roar and bore of Northern wights The tendency so frail is, That men do call those Northern Lights Au-ror-a Bor-ealis.

JEKYLL, in MISS MITFORD's _Letters_.

I'm forced to wink a good deal, for fear of seeing too much, for a neighbourly man must let himself be cheated a little.

_Parson Lingon_, in GEORGE ELIOT's _Felix Holt_.

_Dulce_ it is, and _decorum_, no doubt, for the country to fall,--to Offer one's blood an oblation to Freedom, and die for the Cause; yet Still, individual culture is also something, and no man Finds quite distinct the assurance that he of all others is called on, Or would be justified even, in taking away from the world that Precious creature himself.

_Claude_, in CLOUGH's _Amours de Voyage_.

Notre repentir n'est pas tant un regret du mal que nous avons fait, qu'une crainte de celui qui nous en peut arriver.

LA ROCHEFOUCAULD, _Réflexions_.

_ON AN INANIMATE ACTRESS._

Thou hast a score of parts not good, But two divinely shown: Thy Daphne a true piece of wood, Thy Niobe a stone.

PALLADAS, trans. by R. GARNETT.

We as often repent the good we have done as the ill.

W. HAZLITT, _Characteristics_.

The speech of Old England for me; It serves us on every occasion; Henceforth, like our soil, let it be Exempted from foreign invasion. It answers for friendship and love, For all sorts of feeling and thinking, And lastly, all doubt to remove-- It answers for singing and drinking.

LORD NEAVES, _Songs and Verses_.

A compliment is usually accompanied with a bow, as if to beg pardon for paying it.

_Guesses at Truth._

_THE TRAVELLER AND THE GORILLA._

The gifts by Nature boon supplied This pair unequally divide: The traveller's tale is far from small, The monkey has no tail at all.

R. GARNETT, _Idylls and Epigrams_.

The more a man's worth, the worthier man he must be.

_Dudley Smooth_, in LORD LYTTON's _Money_.

Now to the banquet we press, Now for the eggs and the ham! Now for the mustard and cress, Now for the strawberry jam! Now for the tea of our host, Now for the rollicking bun, Now for the muffin and toast, And now for the gay Sally Lunn!

W. S. GILBERT, _The Sorcerer_.

It was in my schoolboy days that I failed as an actor. The play was the "Ruins of Pompeii." I played the Ruins. It was not a very successful performance, but it was better than the "Burning Mountains." He was not good. He was a bad Vesuvius.

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

He cannot be complete in aught Who is not humorously prone,-- A man without a merry thought Can hardly have a funny bone.

FREDERICK LOCKER, _London Lyrics_.

An actor named Priest was playing at one of the principal theatres. Some one remarked at the Garrick Club that there were a great many more in the pit--"Probably clerks who have taken Priest's orders."

ABRAHAM HAYWARD, _Essays_.

And she? she marries money and a man.

ALFRED AUSTIN, _The Season_.

A lady of my acquaintance, a brunette, happened to show her maid one of those little sticking-plaster profiles which they used to call _silhouettes_. It was the portrait of the lady's aunt, whom the girl had never seen, and she said quite innocently, "La, ma'am, I always thought as how you had some black relations, you are so dark-like yourself, you know!"

FREDERICK LOCKER, _Patchwork_.

He pored upon the leaves, and on the flowers, And heard a voice in all the winds; and then, He thought of wood nymphs and immortal bowers, And how the goddesses came down to men: He miss'd the pathway, he forgot the hours, And when he look'd upon his watch again, He found how much old Time had been a winner-- He also found that he had lost his dinner.

LORD BYRON, _Don Juan_.

Ward had been a Whig, and became ministerial. "I wonder what could make me turn Whig again," said Ward. "That I can tell you," said [Lord] Byron. "They have only to _re-Ward_ you."

CRABB ROBINSON, _Diary_.

_DISTICH._

As the meek beasts in the Garden came flocking for Adam to name them, Men for a title to-day crawl to the feet of a king.

JOHN HAY, _Poems_.

You cannot have everything, as the man said when he was down with small-pox and cholera, and the yellow fever came into the neighbourhood.

C. D. WARNER, _My Summer in a Garden_.

Whene'er I take my walks abroad, How many _rich_ I see! There's A. and B. and C. and D. All better off than me!

R. H. BARHAM, _Life_.

At one period of his boyhood, Macaulay's fancy was much exercised by the threats and terrors of the law. He had a little plot of ground at the back of the house, marked out as his own by a row of oyster-shells, which a maid one day threw away as rubbish. He went straight to the drawing-room, where his mother was entertaining some visitors, walked into the circle, and said very solemnly: "Cursed be Sally; for it is written, 'Cursed is he that removeth his neighbour's landmark.'"

G. O. TREVELYAN, _Life of Macaulay_.

If care were not the waiter Behind a fellow's chair, When easy-going sinners Sit down to Richmond dinners, And life's swift stream flows straighter-- By Jove, it would be rare, If care were not the waiter Behind a fellow's chair.

If wit were always radiant, And wine were always iced, And bores were kicked out straightway Through a convenient gateway; Then down the years' long gradient 'Twere sad to be enticed, If wit were always radiant, And wine were always iced.

MORTIMER COLLINS, in _The Owl_.

Building a staircase for Sir Henry Meux, [Beazley] called it making a new "Gradus ad Parnassum," because it was steps for the _muses_.

J. R. PLANCHÉ, _Recollections_.

I cannot clear the five-bar gate, But, trying first its timber's state, Climb stiffly up, take breath, and wait To trundle over.

WALTER SAVAGE LANDOR.

La constance est la chimère de l'amour.

VAUVENARGUES, _Réflexions_.

_ON AN INTEMPERATE HUSBAND._

Whence comes it that in Clara's face The lily only has a place? Is it because the absent rose Has gone to paint her husband's nose?

_A Collection of Epigrams_ (1727).

[Charles] Sheridan told me that his father, being a good deal plagued by an old maiden relation of his always going out to walk with him, said one day that the weather was bad and rainy; to which the old lady answered that, on the contrary, it had cleared up. "Yes," said Sheridan, "it has cleared enough for _one_, but not for _two_."

THOMAS MOORE, _Diary_.

To Urn, or not to Urn? that is the question: Whether 'tis nobler for our frames to suffer The shows and follies of outrageous custom, Or to take fire--against a sea of zealots-- And, by consuming, end them? To Urn--to keep-- No more: and while we keep, to say we end Contagion and the thousand graveyard ills That flesh is heir to--'tis a consume-ation Devoutly to be wished!

WILLIAM SAWYER.

_ANSWER TO AN INQUIRY._

"_Young author._"--Yes, Agassiz _does_ recommend authors to eat fish, because the phosphorus in it makes brains. So far you are correct. But I cannot help you to a decision about the amount you need to eat--at least, not with certainty. If the specimen composition you send is about your fair usual average, I should judge that perhaps a couple of whales would be all you would want for the present. Not the largest kind, but simply good, middling-sized whales.

MARK TWAIN, _Choice Works_.

The firm of Baxter, Rose, and Norton, Deny the plaintiffs Arthur Orton; But can't deny, what's more important, That he has done what Arthur oughtn't.

ANON.

Hume and his wife and several of their children were with me. Hume repeated the old saying, "One fool makes many." "Ay, Mr. Hume," said I, pointing to the company, "you have a fine family."

CHARLES LAMB, _apud_ CRABB ROBINSON.

Plus on juge, moins on aime.

BALZAC, _Physiologie du Mariage_.