The Wit of Women Fourth Edition

"We claim high rank for the humor of women because it is almost exclusively of this higher, imaginative type. A woman rarely tells an anecdote, or hoards up a good story, or com...

"Have you heard the new invention, my dears, That a man has invented?" said she. "It's a stick with an eye Through which you can tie A thread so long, it acts like a thong, And...

I will now offer you some good things of various degrees of humor. I do not feel it necessary to impress their merits upon you, for they speak for themselves Here is a quaint bi...

By the courtesy of Harper Brothers I am allowed to give you "Aunt Anniky's Teeth," by Sherwood Bonner. The illustrations add much, but the story is good enough without pictures.

Hon. John Winthrop consulted her on the proposed suspension of trade with England in all but the _necessaries_ of life, and she playfully gives a list of articles that would be...

Next comes Mrs. Caroline M. Kirkland with her Western sketches. Many will remember her laughable description of "Borrowing Out West," with its two appropriate mottoes: "Lend me...

To begin a deliberate search for wit seems almost like trying to be witty: a task quite certain to brush the bloom from even the most fruitful results. But the statement of Rich...

In reviewing the _bon-mots_ of Stella, whom Swift pronounced the most witty woman he had ever known, it seems that we are improving. I will give but two of her sayings, which we...

Women show their sense of humor in ridiculing the foibles of their own sex, as Miss Carlotta Perry seeing the danger of "higher education," and Helen Gray Cone laughing over the...

I have reserved for the close numerous instances of woman's facility at badinage and repartee. It is there, after all, that she shines perennial and pre-eminent. You will excuse...

It is surprising that we have so few comedies from women. Dr. Doran mentions five Englishwomen who wrote successful comedies. Of these, three are now forgotten; one, Aphra Behn,...

[_Time, eight o'clock A.M. In the background nurse making bed, etc.; Girl of Two amusing herself surreptitiously with pins, buttons, scissors, etc.; Girl of Eight practising pia...

[_Three hours later; infant and Girl of Two asleep; house in order; lunch and dinner arranged; buttons sewed on Girl of Eight's boots, string on Girl of Ten's hood, and both dis...

_"There was in her soul a sense of delicacy mingled with that rarest of qualities in woman--a sense of humor," writes Richard Grant White in "The Fate of Mansfield Humphreys." I...

[_Takes up pen; lays it down; reads a poem of Mrs. Browning to take the taste of ham-sandwiches out of her mouth, then resumes pen, and writes with increasing interest for fifte...

_Girl of Ten._ Mamma, _please_ give me my music lesson now, so I can go and skate; and then won't you _please_ make some jelly-cake? And see, my dress is torn, and my slate-fram...

_Girl of Ten._ Oh, what a mean lunch! Nothing but bread and ham. I hate bread and ham! All the girls have jelly-cake. Why don't _we_ have jelly-cake? We _used_ to have jelly-cake.

_Enter Mrs. A. Peace restored; children happy with nurse. Seizes pen and writes rapidly. Doorbell rings, cook announces caller; nobody Mrs. A. wants to see, but somebody she MUS...