Chapter 27

At a recent conference of Baptists, Methodists, and English Friends, in the city of Chengtu, China, two Chinamen were heard discussing the three denominations. One of them said to the other:

"They say these denominations have different beliefs. Just what is the difference between them?"

"Oh," said the other, "Not much! Big washee, little washee, no washee, that is all."

A recent book on Russia relates the story of the anger of the Apostle John because a certain peasant burned no tapers to his ikon, but honored, instead, the ikon of Apostle Peter in St. John's own church. The two apostles talked it over as they walked the fields near Kieff, and Apostle John decided to send a terrible storm to destroy the just ripe corn of the peasant. His decision was carried out, and the next day he met Apostle Peter and boasted of his punishing wrath.

And Apostle Peter only laughed. "Ai, yi, yi, Apostle John," he said, "what a mess you've made of it. I stepped around, saw my friend, and told him what you were going to do, so he sold his corn to the priest of your church."

The priest of a New York parish met one of his parishioners, who had long been out of work, and asked him whether he had found anything to do. The man grinned with infinite satisfaction, and replied:

"Yiss indade, ycr Riverince, an' a foine job too! Oi'm gettin' three dollars a day fur pullin' down a Prodesant church!"

A man addicted to walking in his sleep went to bed all right one night, but when he awoke he found himself on the street in the grasp of a policeman. "Hold on," he cried, "you mustn't arrest me. I'm a somnambulist." To which the policeman replied: "I don't care what your religion is--yer can't walk the streets in yer nightshirt."

The friendship existing between Father Kelly and Rabbi Levi is proof against differences in race and religion. Each distinguished for his learning, his eloquence and his wit; and they delight in chaffing each other. They were seated opposite each other at a banquet where some delicious roast ham was served and Father Kelly made comments upon its flavor. Presently he leaned forward and in a voice that carried far, he addressed his friend:

"Rabbi Levi, when are you going to become liberal enough to eat ham?"

"At your wedding, Father Kelly," retorted the rabbi.

The broad-minded see the truth in different religions; the narrow-minded see only their differences.--_Chinese Proverb_.

REMEDIES

MISTRESS--"Did the mustard plaster do you any good, Bridget?"

MAID--"Yes; but, begorry, mum, it do bite the tongue!"

SUFFERER--"I have a terrible toothache and want something to cure it."

FRIEND--"Now, you don't need any medicine. I had a toothache yesterday and I went home and my loving wife kissed me and so consoled me that the pain soon passed away. Why don't you try the same?"

SUFFERER--"I think I will. Is your wife at home now?"

For every ill beneath the sun There is some remedy or none; If there be one, resolve to find it; If not, submit, and never mind it.

REMINDERS

The wife of an overworked promoter said at breakfast:

"Will you post this letter for me, dear? It's to the furrier, countermanding my order for that $900 sable and ermine stole. You'll be sure to remember?"

The tired eyes of the harassed, shabby promoter lit up with joy. He seized a skipping rope that lay with a heap of dolls and toys in a corner, and going to his wife, he said:

"Here, tie my right hand to my left foot so I won't forget!"

REPARTEE

Repartee is saying on the instant what you didn't say until the next morning.

Among the members of a working gang on a certain railroad was an Irishman who claimed to be very good at figures. The boss, thinking that he would get ahead of Pat, said: "Say, Pat, how many shirts can you get out of a yard?"

"That depends," answered Pat, "on whose yard you get into."

A middle-aged farmer accosted a serious-faced youth outside the Grand Central Station in New York the other day.

"Young man," he said, plucking his sleeve, "I wanter go to Central Park."

The youth seemed lost in consideration for a moment.

"Well," he said finally, "you may just this once. But I don't want you ever, _ever_ to ask me again."

SEEDY VISITOR--"Do you have many wrecks about here, boatman?"

BOATMAN--"Not very many, sir. You're the first I've seen this season."

HER DAD--"No, sir; I won't have my daughter tied for life to a stupid fool."

HER SUITOR--"Then don't you think you'd better let me take her off your hands?"

Wendell Phillips was traveling through Ohio once when he fell in with a car full of ministers returning from a convention. One of the ministers, a southerner from Kentucky, was naturally not very cordial to the opinions of the great abolitionist and set out to embarrass Mr. Phillips. So, before the group of ministers, he said:

"You are Wendell Phillips, are you not?"

"Yes," answered the great abolitionist.

"And you are trying to free the niggers, aren't you?"

"Yes, sir; I am."

"Well, why do you preach your doctrines up here? Why don't you go over into Kentucky?"

"Excuse me, are you a preacher?"

"I am, sir."

"Are you trying to save souls from hell?"

"Yes, sir; that is my business."

"Well, why don't you go there then?" asked Mr. Phillips.

SOLEMN SENIOR--"So your efforts to get on the team were fruitless, were they?"

FOOLISH FRESHMAN--"Oh, no! Not at all. They gave me a lemon."--_Harvard Lampoon_.

A benevolent person watched a workman laboriously windlassing rock from a shaft while the broiling sun was beating down on his bare head.

"My dear man," observed the onlooker, "are you not afraid that your brain will be affected in the hot sun?"

The laborer contemplated him for a moment and then replied:

"Do you think a man with any brains would be working at this kind of a job?"

Winston Churchill, the young English statesman, recently began to raise a mustache, and while it was still in the budding stage he was asked at a dinner party to take in to dinner an English girl who had decided opposing political views.

"I am sorry," said Mr. Churchill, "we cannot agree on politics."

"No, we can't," rejoined the girl, "for to be frank with you I like your politics about as little as I do your mustache."

"Well," replied Mr. Churchill, "remember that you are not likely to come into contact with either."

Strickland Gillilan, the lecturer and the man who pole-vaulted into fame by his "Off Ag'in, On Ag'in, Finnigin" verses, was about to deliver a lecture in a small Missouri town. He asked the chairman of the committee whether he might have a small pitcher of ice-water on the platform table.

"To drink?" queried the committeeman.

"No," answered Gillilan. "I do a high-diving act."

TRAVELER--"Say, boy, your corn looks kind of yellow."

BOY--"Yes, sir. That's the kind we planted."

TRAVELER--"Looks as though you will only have half a crop."

BOY--"Don't expect any more. The landlord gets the other half."

TRAVELER (after a moment's thought)--"Say, there is not much difference between you and a fool."

BOY--"No, sir. Only the fence."

President Lincoln was busily engaged in his office when an attendant, a young man of sixteen, unceremoniously entered and gave him a card. Without rising, the President glanced at the card. "Pshaw. She here again? I told her last week that I could not interfere in her case. I cannot see her," he said impatiently. "Get rid of her any way you can. Tell her I am asleep, or anything you like."

Quickly returning to the lady in an adjacent room, this exceedingly bright boy said to her, "The President told me to tell you that he is asleep."

The lady's eyes sparkled as she responded, "Ah, he says he is asleep, eh? Well, will you be kind enough to return and ask him when he intends to wake up?"

The garrulous old lady in the stern of the boat had pestered the guide with her comments and questions ever since they had started. Her meek little husband, who was hunched toad-like in the bow, fished in silence. The old lady had seemingly exhausted every possible point in fish and animal life, woodcraft, and personal history when she suddenly espied one of those curious paths of oily, unbroken water frequently seen on small lakes which are ruffled by a light breeze.

"Oh, guide, guide," she exclaimed, "what makes that funny streak in the water--No, there--Right over there!"

The guide was busy re-baiting the old gentleman's hook and merely mumbled "U-m-mm."

"Guide," repeated the old lady in tones that were not to be denied, "look right over there where I'm pointing and tell me what makes that funny streak in the water."

The guide looked up from his baiting with a sigh.

"That? Oh, that's where the road went across the ice last winter."

Nothing more clearly expresses the sentiments of Harvard men in seasons of athletic rivalry than the time-honored "To hell with Yale!"

Once when Dean Briggs, of Harvard, and Edward Everett Hale were on their way to a game at Soldiers' Field a friend asked:

"Where are you going, Dean?"

"To yell with Hale," answered Briggs with a meaning smile.

John Kendrick Bangs one day called up his wife on the telephone. The maid at the other end did not recognize her "master's voice," and after Bangs had told her whom he wanted the maid asked:

"Do you wish to speak with Mrs. Bangs?"

"No, indeed," replied the humorist; "I want to kiss her."

A boy took a position in an office where two different telephones were installed.

"Your wife would like to speak to you on the 'phone, sir," he said to his employer.

"Which one?" inquired the boss, starting toward the two booths.

"Please, sir, she didn't say, and I didn't know that you had more than one."

An Englishman was being shown the sights along the Potomac. "Here," remarked the American, "is where George Washington threw a dollar across the river."

"Well," replied the Englishman, "that is not very remarkable, for a dollar went much further in those days than it does now."

The American would not be worsted, so, after a short pause, he said: "But Washington accomplished a greater feat than that. He once chucked a sovereign across the Atlantic."

Pat was busy on a road working with his coat off. There were two Englishmen laboring on the same road, so they decided to have a joke with the Irishman. They painted a donkey's head on the back of Pat's coat, and watched to see him put it on. Pat, of course, saw the donkey's head on his coat, and, turning to the Englishmen, said:

"Which of yez wiped your face on me coat?"

A district leader went to Sea Girt, in 1912, to see the Democratic candidate for President. In the course of an animated conversation, the leader, noticing that Governor Wilson's eyeglasses were perched perilously near the tip of his nose remarked: "Your glasses, Governor, are almost on your mouth."

"That's all right," was the quick response. "I want to see what I'm talking about."

According to the London _Globe_ two Germans were halted at the French frontier by the customs officers. "We have each to declare three bottles of red wine," said one of the Germans to the _douaniers_. "How much to pay?"

"Where are the bottles?" asked the customs man.

"They are within!" laughed the Teuton making a gesture.

The French _douanier_, unruffled, took down his tariff book and read, or pretended to read: "Wines imported in bottles pay so much, wines imported in barrels pay so much, and wines _en peaux d'âne_ pay no duty. You can pass, gentlemen."

A small boy was hoeing corn in a sterile field by the roadside, when a passer-by stopped and said:

"'Pears to me your corn is rather small."

"Certainly," said the boy; "it's dwarf corn."

"But it looks yaller."

"Certainly; we planted the yaller kind."

"But it looks as if you wouldn't get more than half a crop."

"Of course not; we planted it on halves."

REPORTING

_See_ Journalism; Newspapers.

REPUBLICAN PARTY

The morning after a banquet, during the Democratic convention in Baltimore, a prominent Republican thus greeted an equally well-known Democrat:

"I understand there were some Republicans at the banquet last night."

"Oh, yes," said the Democrat genially, "one waited on me."

REPUTATION

Popularity is when people like you; and reputation is when they ought to, but really can't.--_Frank Richardson_.

RESEMBLANCES

Senator Blackburn is a thorough Kentuckian, and has all the local pride of one born in the blue-grass section of his State. He also has the prejudice against being taken for an Indianian which seems inherent in all native-born Kentuckians. While coming to Congress, several sessions ago, he was approached in the Pullman coach by a New Yorker, who, after bowing politely to him, said:

"Is not this Senator Blackburn of Indiana?"

The Kentuckian sprang from his seat, and glaring at his interlocutor exclaimed angrily:

"No, sir, by ----. The reason I look so bad is I have been sick!"

"Every time the baby looks into my face he smiles," said Mr. Meekins.

"Well," answered his wife, "it may not be exactly polite, but it shows he has a sense of humor."

Mark Twain constantly received letters and photographs from men who had been told that they looked like him. One was from Florida, and the likeness, as shown by the man's picture, was really remarkable so remarkable, indeed, that Mr. Clemens sent the following acknowledgment:

"My Dear Sir: I thank you very much for your letter and the photograph. In my opinion you are certainly more like me than any other of my doubles. In fact, I am sure that if you stood before me in a mirrorless frame I could shave by you."

NEIGHBOR: "Johnny, I think in looks you favor your mother a great deal."

JOHNNY: "Well. I may look like her, but do you tink dat's a favor?"

RESIGNATION

"Then you don't think I practice what I preach, eh?" queried the minister in talking with one of the deacons at a meeting.

"No, sir, I don't," replied the deacon "You've been preachin' on the subject of resignation for two years an' ye haven't resigned yet."

RESPECTABILITY

"Is he respectable?"'

"Eminently so. He's never been indicted for anything less than stealing a railroad."--_Wasp_.

REST CURE

A weather-beaten damsel somewhat over six feet in height and with a pair of shoulders proportionately broad appeared at a back door in Wyoming and asked for light housework. She said that her name was Lizzie, and explained that she had been ill with typhoid and was convalescing.

"Where did you come from, Lizzie?" inquired the woman of the house. "Where have you been?"

"I've been workin' out on Howell's ranch," replied Lizzie, "diggin' post-holes while I was gittin' my strength back."

RETALIATION

You know that fellow, Jim McGroiarty, the lad that's always comin' up and thumpin' ye on the chest and yellin', 'How are ye?'"

"I know him."

"I'll bet he's smashed twinty cigars for me--some of them clear Havanny--but I'll get even with him now."

"How will you do it?"

"I'll tell ye. Jim always hits me over the vest pocket where I carry my cigars. He'll hit me just once more. There's no cigar in me vest pocket this mornin'. Instead of it, there's a stick of dynamite, d'ye mind!"

Once when Henry Ward Beecher was in the midst of an eloquent political speech some wag in the audience crowed like a cock. It was done to perfection and the audience was convulsed with laughter. The great orator's friends felt uneasy as to his reception of the interruption.

But Mr. Beecher stood perfectly calm. He stopped speaking, listened till the crowing ceased, and while the audience was laughing he pulled out his watch. Then he said: "That's strange. My watch says it is only ten o'clock. But there can't be any mistake about it. It must be morning, for the instincts of the lower animals are absolutely infallible."

An Episcopal clergyman, rector of a fashionable church in one of Boston's most exclusive suburbs, so as not to be bothered with the innumerable telephone calls that fall to one in his profession, had his name left out of the telephone book. A prominent merchant of the same name, living in the same suburb, was continually annoyed by requests to officiate at funerals and baptisms. He went to the rector, told his troubles in a kindly way, and asked the parson to have his name put in the directory. But without success.

The merchant then determined to complain to the telephone company. As he was writing the letter, one Saturday evening, the telephone rang and the timid voice of a young man asked if the Rev. Mr. Blank would marry him at once. A happy thought came to the merchant: "No, I'm too damn busy writing my sermon," he replied.

REVOLUTIONS

Haiti was in the midst of a revolution.

As a phase of it two armed bodies were approaching each other so that a third was about to be caught between them.

The commander of the third party saw the predicament. On the right government troops, on the left insurgents.

"General, why do you not give the order to fire?" asked an aide, dashing up on a lame mule.

"I would like to," responded the general, "but, Great Scott! I can't remember which side we're fighting for."

REWARDS

Said a great Congregational preacher To a hen, "You're a beautiful creature." And the hen, just for that, Laid an egg in his hat, And thus did the Hen reward Beecher.

RHEUMATISM

FARMER BARNES--"I've bought a barometer, Hannah, to tell when it's going to rain, ye know."

MRS. BARNES--"To tell when it's goin' to rain! Why, I never heard o' such extravagance. What do ye s'pose th' Lord has given ye th' rheumatis for?"--_Tit-Bits_.

ROADS

A Yankee just returning to the states was dining with an Englishman, and the latter complained of the mud in America.

"Yes," said the American, "but it's nothing to the mud over here."

"Nonsense!" said the Englishman.

"Fact," the American replied. "Why, this afternoon I had a remarkable adventure--came near getting into trouble with an old gentleman--all through your confounded mud."

"Some of the streets are a little greasy at this season, I admit," said the Englishman. "What was your adventure, though?"

"Well," said the American, "as I was walking along I noticed that the mud was very thick, and presently I saw a high hat afloat on a large puddle of very rich ooze. Thinking to do some one a kindness, I gave the hat a poke with my stick, when an old gentleman looked up from beneath, surprised and frowning. 'Hello!' I said. 'You're in pretty deep!' 'Deeper than you think,' he said. 'I'm on the top of an omnibus!'"

ROASTS

As William Faversham was having his luncheon in a Birmingham hotel he was much annoyed by another visitor, who, during the whole of the meal, stood with his back to the fire warming himself and watching Faversham eat. At length, unable to endure it any longer, Mr. Faversham rang the bell and said:

"Waiter, kindly turn that gentleman around. I think he is done on that side."

ROOSEVELT, THEODORE

A delegation from Kansas visited Theodore Roosevelt at Oyster Bay some years ago, while he was president. The host met them with coat and collar off, mopping his brow.

"Ah, gentlemen," he said, "dee-lighted to see you. Dee-lighted. But I'm very busy putting in my hay just now. Come down to the barn with me and we'll talk things over while I work."

Down to the barn hustled President and delegation.

Mr. Roosevelt seized a pitchfork and--but where was the hay?

"John!" shouted the President. "John! where's all the hay?"

"Sorry, sir," came John's voice from the loft, "but I ain't had time to throw it back since you threw it up for yesterday's delegation."

SALARIES

A country school-teacher was cashing her monthly check at the bank. The teller apologized for the filthy condition of the bills, saying, "I hope you're not afraid of microbes."

"Not a bit of it," the schoolma'am replied. "I'm sure no microbe could live on my salary!"--_Frances Kirkland_.

SALESMEN AND SALESMANSHIP

A darky fruit-dealer in Georgia has a sign above his wares that reads:

Watermelons

Our choice 25 cents.

Your choice 35 cents.

--_Elgin Burroughs_.

The quick wit of a traveling salesman who has since become a well-known merchant was severely tested one day. He sent in his card by the office-boy to the manager of a large concern, whose inner office was separated from the waiting-room by a ground-glass partition. When the boy handed his card to the manager the salesman saw him impatiently tear it in half and throw it in the waste-basket; the boy came out and told the caller that he could not see the chief. The salesman told the boy to go back and get him his card; the boy brought out five cents, with the message that his card was torn up. Then the salesman took out another card and sent the boy back, saying: "Tell your boss I sell two cards for five cents."

He got his interview and sold a large bill of goods.

A young man entered a hat store and asked to see the latest styles in derbies. He was evidently hard to please, for soon the counter was covered with hats that he had tried on and found wanting. At last the salesman picked up a brown derby, brushed it off on his sleeve, and extended it admiringly.

"These are being very much worn this season, sir," he said. "Won't you try it on?"

The customer put the hat on and surveyed himself critically in the mirror. "You're sure it's in style?"

"The most fashionable thing we have in the shop, sir. And it suits you to perfection--if the fit's right."

"Yes, it fits very well. So you think I had better have it?"

"I don't think you could do better."

"No, I don't think I could. So I guess I won't buy a new one after all."

The salesman had been boosting the customer's old hat, which had become mixed among the many new ones.

VISITOR--"Can I see that motorist who was brought here an hour ago?"

NURSE--"He hasn't come to his senses yet."

VISITOR--"Oh, that's all right. I only want to sell him another car."--_Judge_.

"That fellow is too slick for me. Sold me a lot that was two feet under water. I went around to demand my money back."

"Get it?"

"Get nothing! Then he sold me a second-hand gasoline launch and a copy of 'Venetian Life,' by W.D. Howells."

In a small South Carolina town that was "finished" before the war, two men were playing checkers in the back of a store. A traveling man who was making his first trip to the town was watching the game, and, not being acquainted with the business methods of the citizens, he called the attention of the owner of the store to some customers who had just entered the front door.

"Sh! Sh!" answered the storekeeper, making another move on the checkerboard. "Keep perfectly quiet and they'll go out."

He who finds he has something to sell, And goes and whispers it down a well, Is not so apt to collar the dollars, As he who climbs a tree and hollers.

--_The Advertiser_

SALOONS

"Where can I get a drink in this town?" asked a traveling man who landed at a little town in the oil region of Oklahoma, of the 'bus driver.

"See that millinery shop over there?" asked the driver, pointing to a building near the depot.

"You don't mean to say they sell whiskey in a millinery store?" exclaimed the drummer.

"No, I mean that's the only place here they don't sell it," said the 'bus man.

SALVATION

WILLIS--"Some of these rich fellows seem to think that they can buy their way into heaven by leaving a million dollars to a church when they die."

GILLIS--"I don't know but that they stand as much chance as some of these other rich fellows who are trying to get in on the instalment plan of ten cents a Sunday while they're living."--_Lauren S. Hamilton_.

An Italian noble at church one day gave a priest who begged for the souls in purgatory, a piece of gold.

"Ah, my lord," said the good father, "you have now delivered a soul."

The count threw another piece upon the plate.

"Here is another soul delivered," said the priest.

"Are you positive of it?" replied the count.

"Yes, my lord," replied the priest; "I am certain they are now in heaven."