Chapter 5

"What!" exclaimed the commander. "What do you think I'm running? A freighter?"

"Oh, well, you needn't get excited about it," purred Poe. "My fifty-four pieces consist of one pair of socks and a pack of playing cards."

BALDNESS

One mother who still considers Marcel waves as the most fashionable way of dressing the hair was at work on the job.

Her little eight-year-old girl was crouched on her father's lap, watching her mother. Every once in a while the baby fingers would slide over the smooth and glossy pate which is Father's.

"No waves for you, Father," remarked the little one. "You're all beach."

"Were any of your boyish ambitions ever realized?" asked the sentimentalist.

"Yes," replied the practical person. "When my mother used to cut my hair I often wished I might be bald-headed."

Congressman Longworth is not gifted with much hair, his head being about as shiny as a billiard ball.

One day ex-president Taft, then Secretary of War, and Congressman Longworth sallied into a barbershop.

"Hair cut?" asked the barber of Longworth.

"Yes," answered the Congressman.

"Oh, no, Nick," commented the Secretary of War from the next chair, "you don't want a hair cut; you want a shine."

"O, Mother, why are the men in the front baldheaded?"

"They bought their tickets from scalpers, my child."

The costumer came forward to attend to the nervous old beau who was mopping his bald and shining poll with a big silk handkerchief.

"And what can I do for you?" he asked.

"I want a little help in the way of a suggestion," said the old fellow. "I intend going to the French Students' masquerade ball to-night, and I want a distinctly original costume--something I may be sure no one else will wear. What would you suggest?"

The costumer looked him over attentively, bestowing special notice on the gleaming knob.

"Well, I'll tell you," he said then, thoughtfully: "why don't you sugar your head and go as a pill?"--_Frank X. Finnegan_.

United States Senator Ollie James, of Kentucky, is bald.

"Does being bald bother you much?" a candid friend asked him once.

"Yes, a little," answered the truthful James.

"I suppose you feel the cold severely in winter," went on the friend.

"No; it's not that so much," said the Senator. "The main bother is when I'm washing myself--unless I keep my hat on I don't know where my face stops."

A near-sighted old lady at a dinner-party, one evening, had for her companion on the left a very bald-headed old gentleman. While talking to the gentleman at her right she dropped her napkin unconsciously. The bald-headed gentleman, in stooping to pick it up, touched her arm. The old lady turned around, shook her head, and very politely said: "No melon, thank you."

BANKS AND BANKING

During a financial panic, a German farmer went to a bank for some money. He was told that the bank was not paying out money, but was using cashier's checks. He could not understand this, and insisted on money.

The officers took him in hand, one after another, with little effect. At last the president tried his hand, and after long and minute explanation, some inkling of the situation seemed to be dawning on the farmer's mind. Much encouraged, the president said: "You understand now how it is, don't you, Mr.. Schmidt?"

"I t'ink I do," admitted Mr. Schmidt. "It's like dis, aindt it? Ven my baby vakes up at night and vants some milk, I gif him a milk ticket."

She advanced to the paying teller's window and, handing in a check for fifty dollars, stated that it was a birthday present from her husband and asked for payment. The teller informed her that she must first endorse it.

"I don't know what you mean," she said hesitatingly.

"Why, you see," he explained, "you must write your name on the back, so that when we return the check to your husband, he will know we have paid you the money."

"Oh, is that all?" she said, relieved.... One minute elapses.

Thus the "endorsement": "Many thanks, dear, I've got the money. Your loving wife, Evelyn."

FRIEND--"So you're going to make it hot for that fellow who held up the bank, shot the cashier, and got away with the ten thousand?"

BANKER--"Yes, indeed. He was entirely too fresh. There's a decent way to do that, you know. If he wanted to get the money, why didn't he come into the bank and work his way up the way the rest of us did?"--_Puck_.

BAPTISM

A revival was being held at a small colored Baptist church in southern Georgia. At one of the meetings the evangelist, after an earnest but fruitless exhortation, requested all of the congregation who wanted their souls washed white as snow to stand up. One old darky remained sitting.

"Don' yo' want y' soul washed w'ite as snow, Brudder Jones?"

"Mah soul done been washed w'ite as snow, pahson."

"Whah wuz yo' soul washed w'ite as snow, Brudder Jones?"

"Over yander to the Methodis' chu'ch acrost de railroad."

"Brudder Jones, yo' soul wa'n't washed--hit were dry-cleaned."--_Life_.

BAPTISTS

An old colored man first joined the Episcopal Church, then the Methodist and next the Baptist, where he remained. Questioned as to the reason for his church travels he responded:

"Well, suh, hit's this way: de 'Piscopals is gemmen, suh, but I couldn't keep up wid de answerin' back in dey church. De Methodis', dey always holdin' inquiry meetin', and I don't like too much inquirin' into. But de Baptis', suh, dey jes' dip and are done wid hit."

A Methodist negro exhorter shouted: "Come up en jine de army ob de Lohd." "I'se done jined," replied one of the congregation. "Whar'd yoh jine?" asked the exhorter. "In de Baptis' Chu'ch." "Why, chile," said the exhorter, "yoh ain't in the army; yoh's in de navy."

BARGAINS

MANAGER (five-and-ten-cent store)--"What did the lady who just went out want?"

SHOPGIRL--"She inquired if we had a shoe department."

"Hades," said the lady who loves to shop, "would be a magnificent and endless bargain counter and I looking on without a cent."

Newell Dwight Hillis, the now famous New York preacher and author, some years ago took charge of the First Presbyterian Church of Evanston, Illinois. Shortly after going there he required the services of a physician, and on the advice of one of his parishioners called in a doctor noted for his ability properly to emphasize a good story, but who attended church very rarely. He proved very satisfactory to the young preacher, but for some reason could not be induced to render a bill. Finally Dr. Hillis, becoming alarmed at the inroads the bill might make in his modest stipend, went to the physician and said, "See here, Doctor, I must know how much I owe you."

After some urging, the physician replied: "Well, I'll tell you what I'll do with you, Hillis. They say you're a pretty good preacher, and you seem to think I am a fair doctor, so I'll make this bargain with you. I'll do all I can to keep you out of heaven if you do all you can to keep me out of hell, and it won't cost either of us a cent. Is it a go?"

"My wife and myself are trying to get up a list of club magazines. By taking three you get a discount."

"How are you making out?"

"Well, we can get one that I don't want, and one that she doesn't want, and one that neither wants for $2.25."

BASEBALL

A run in time saves the nine.

Knowin' all 'bout baseball is jist 'bout as profitable as bein' a good whittler.--_Abe Martin_.

"Plague take that girl!"

"My friend, that is the most beautiful girl in this town."

"That may be. But she obstructs my view of second base."

When Miss Cheney, one of the popular teachers in the Swarthmore schools, had to deal with a boy who played "hookey," she failed to impress him with the evil of his ways.

"Don't you know what becomes of little boys who stay away from school to play baseball?" asked Miss Cheney.

"Yessum," replied the lad promptly. "Some of 'em gets to be good players and pitch in the big leagues."

BATHS AND BATHING

The only unoccupied room in the hotel--one with a private bath in connection with it--was given to the stranger from Kansas. The next morning the clerk was approached by the guest when the latter was ready to check out.

"Well, did you have a good night's rest?" the clerk asked.

"No, I didn't," replied the Kansan. "The room was all right, and the bed was pretty good, but I couldn't sleep very much for I was afraid some one would want to take a bath, and the only door to it was through my room."

RURAL CONSTABLE-"Now then, come out o' that. Bathing's not allowed 'ere after 8 a.m."

THE FACE IN THE WATER-"Excuse me, Sergeant, I'm not bathing; I'm only drowning."--_Punch_.

A woman and her brother lived alone in the Scotch Highlands. She knitted gloves and garments to sell in the Lowland towns. Once when she was starting out to market her wares, her brother said he would go with her and take a dip in the ocean. While the woman was in the town selling her work, Sandy was sporting in the waves. When his sister came down to join him, however, he met her with a wry face. "Oh, Kirstie," he said, "I've lost me weskit." They hunted high and low, but finally as night settled down decided that the waves must have carried it out to sea.

The next year, at about the same season, the two again visited the town. And while Kirstie sold her wool in the town, Sandy splashed about in the brine. When Kirstie joined her brother she found him with a radiant face, and he cried out to her, "Oh, Kirstie, I've found me weskit. 'Twas under me shirt."

In one of the lesser Indian hill wars an English detachment took an Afghan prisoner. The Afghan was very dirty. Accordingly two privates were deputed to strip and wash him.

The privates dragged the man to a stream of running water, undressed him, plunged him in, and set upon him lustily with stiff brushes and large cakes of white soap.

After a long time one of the privates came back to make a report. He saluted his officer and said disconsolately:

"It's no use, sir. It's no use."

"No use?" said the officer. "What do you mean? Haven't you washed that Afghan yet?"

"It's no use, sir," the private repeated. "We've washed him for two hours, but it's no use."

"How do you mean it's no use?" said the officer angrily.

"Why, sir," said the private, "after rubbin' him and scrubbin' him till our arms ached I'll be hanged if we didn't come to another suit of clothes."

BAZARS

Once upon a time a deacon who did not favor church bazars was going along a dark street when a footpad suddenly appeared, and, pointing his pistol, began to relieve his victim of his money.

The thief, however, apparently suffered some pangs of remorse. "It's pretty rough to be gone through like this, ain't it, sir?" he inquired.

"Oh, that's all right, my man," the "held-up" one answered cheerfully. "I was on my way to a bazar. You're first, and there's an end of it."

BEARDS

There was an old man with a beard, Who said, "It is just as I feared!-- Two owls and a hen, Four larks and a wren, Have all built their nests in my beard."

BEAUTY

If eyes were made for seeing, Then beauty is its own excuse for being.

--Emerson.

A thing of beauty is a joy forever; Its loveliness increases; it will never Pass into nothingness; but still will keep A bower quiet for us, and a sleep Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.

BEAUTY, PERSONAL

In good looks I am not a star. There are others more lovely by far. But my face--I don't mind it, Because I'm behind it-- It's the people in front that I jar.

"Shine yer boots, sir?"

"No," snapped the man.

"Shine 'em so's yer can see yer face in 'em?" urged the bootblack.

"No, I tell you!"

"Coward," hissed the bootblack.

A farmer returning home late at night, found a man standing beside the house with a lighted lantern in his hand. "What are you doing here?" he asked, savagely, suspecting he had caught a criminal. For answer came a chuckle, and--"It's only mee, zur."

The farmer recognized John, his shepherd.

"It's you, John, is it? What on earth are you doing here this time o' night?"

Another chuckle. "I'm a-coortin' Ann, zur."

"And so you've come courting with a lantern, you fool. Why I never took a lantern when I courted your mistress."

"No, zur, you didn't, zur," John chuckled. "We can all zee you didn't, zur."

The senator and the major were walking up the avenue. The senator was more than middle-aged and considerably more than fat, and, dearly as the major loved him, he also loved his joke.

The senator turned with a pleased expression on his benign countenance and said, "Major, did you see that pretty girl smile at me?"

"Oh, that's nothing," replied his friend. "The first time I saw you I laughed out loud!"--_Harper's Magazine_.

Pat, thinking to enliven the party, stated, with watch in hand: "I'll presint a box of candy to the loidy that makes the homeliest face within the next three minutes."

The time expired, Pat announced: "Ah, Mrs. McGuire, you get the prize."

"But," protested Mrs. McGuire, "go way wid ye! I wasn't playin' at all."

ARTHUR--"They say dear, that people who live together get to look alike."

KATE--"Then you must consider my refusal as final."

In the negro car of a railway train in one of the gulf states a bridal couple were riding--a very light, rather good looking colored girl and a typical full blooded negro of possibly a reverted type, with receding forehead, protruding eyes, broad, flat nose very thick lips and almost no chin. He was positively and aggressively ugly.

They had been married just before boarding the train and, like a good many of their white brothers and sisters, were very much interested in each other, regardless of the amusement of their neighbors. After various "billings and cooings" the man sank down in the seat and, resting his head on the lady's shoulder, looked soulfully up into her eyes.

She looked fondly down upon him and after a few minutes murmured gently, "Laws, honey, ain't yo' shamed to be so han'some?"

Little dabs of powder, Little specks of paint, Make my lady's freckles Look as if they ain't.

--_Mary A. Fairchild_.

He kissed her on the cheek, It seemed a harmless frolic; He's been laid up a week They say, with painter's colic.

--_The Christian Register_.

MOTHER (to inquisitive child)--"Stand aside. Don't you see the gentleman wants to take the lady's picture?"

"Why does he want to?"--_Life_.

One day, while walking with a friend in San Francisco, a professor and his companion became involved in an argument as to which was the handsomer man of the two. Not being able to arrive at a settlement of the question, they agreed, in a spirit of fun, to leave it to the decision of a Chinaman who was seen approaching them. The matter being laid before him, the Oriental considered long and carefully; then he announced in a tone of finality, "Both are worse."

"What a homely woman!"

"Sir, that is my wife. I'll have you understand it is a woman's privilege to be homely."

"Gee, then she abused the privilege."

Beauty is worse than wine; it intoxicates both the holder and the beholder.--_Zimmermann_.

BEDS

A western politician tells the following story as illustrating the inconveniences attached to campaigning in certain sections of the country.

Upon his arrival at one of the small towns in South Dakota, where he was to make a speech the following day, he found that the so-called hotel was crowded to the doors. Not having telegraphed for accommodations, the politician discovered that he would have to make shift as best he could. Accordingly, he was obliged for that night to sleep on a wire cot which had only some blankets and a sheet on it. As the politician is an extremely fat man, he found his improvised bed anything but comfortable.

"How did you sleep?" asked a friend in the morning.

"Fairly well," answered the fat man, "but I looked like a waffle when I got up."

BEER

A man to whom illness was chronic, When told that he needed a tonic, Said, "O Doctor dear, Won't you please make it beer?" "No, no," said the Doc., "that's Teutonic."

BEES

TEACHER--"Tommy, do you know 'How Doth the Little Busy Bee'?"

TOMMY--"No; I only know he doth it!"

BEETLES

Now doth the frisky June Bug Bring forth his aeroplane, And try to make a record, And busticate his brain!

He bings against the mirror, He bangs against the door, He caroms on the ceiling, And turtles on the floor!

He soars aloft, erratic, He lands upon my neck, And makes me creep and shiver, A neurasthenic wreck!

--_Charles Irvin Junkin_.

BEGGING

THE "ANGEL" (about to give a beggar a dime)--"Poor man! And are you married?"

BEGGAR--"Pardon me, madam! D'ye think I'd be relyin' on total strangers for support if I had a wife?"

MAN--"Is there any reason why I should give you five cents?"

BOY--"Well, if I had a nice high hat like yours I wouldn't want it soaked with snowballs."

MILLIONAIRE (to ragged beggar)--"You ask alms and do not even take your hat off. Is that the proper way to beg?"

BEGGAR--"Pardon me, sir. A policeman is looking at us from across the street. If I take my hat off he'll arrest me for begging; as it is, he naturally takes us for old friends."

Once, while Bishop Talbot, the giant "cowboy bishop," was attending a meeting of church dignitaries in St. Paul, a tramp accosted a group of churchmen in the hotel porch and asked for aid.

"No," one of them told him, "I'm afraid we can't help you. But you see that big man over there?" pointing to Bishop Talbot.

"Well, he's the youngest bishop of us all, and he's a very generous man. You might try him."

The tramp approached Bishop Talbot confidently. The others watched with interest. They saw a look of surprise come over the tramp's face. The bishop was talking eagerly. The tramp looked troubled. And then, finally, they saw something pass from one hand to the other. The tramp tried to slink past the group without speaking, but one of them called to him:

"Well, did you get something from our young brother?"

The tramp grinned sheepishly. "No," he admitted, "I gave him a dollar for his damned new cathedral at Laramie!"

To get thine ends, lay bashfulnesse aside; Who feares to aske, doth teach to be deny'd.

--_Herrick_.

Well, whiles I am a beggar I will rail And say, there is no sin but to be rich; And being rich, my virtue then shall be To say, there is no vice but beggary.

--_Shakespeare_.

_See also_ Flattery; Millionaires.

BETTING

The officers' mess was discussing rifle shooting.

"I'll bet anyone here," said one young lieutenant, "that I can fire twenty shots at two hundred yards and call each shot correctly without waiting for the marker. I'll stake a box of cigars that I can."

"Done!" cried a major.

The whole mess was on hand early next morning to see the experiment tried.

The lieutenant fired.

"Miss," he calmly announced.

A second shot.

"Miss," he repeated.

A third shot.

"Miss."

"Here, there! Hold on!" protested the major. "What are you trying to do? You're not shooting for the target at all."

"Of course not," admitted the lieutenant. "I'm firing for those cigars." And he got them.

Two old cronies went into a drug store in the downtown part of New York City, and, addressing the proprietor by his first name, one of them said:

"Dr. Charley, we have made a bet of the ice-cream sodas. We will have them now and when the bet is decided the loser will drop in and pay for them."

As the two old fellows were departing after enjoying their temperance beverage, the druggist asked them what the wager was.

"Well," said one of them, "our friend George bets that when the tower of the Singer Building falls, it will topple over toward the North River, and I bet that it won't."

BIBLE INTERPRETATION

"Miss Jane, did Moses have the same after-dinner complaint my papa's got?" asked Percy of his governess.

"Gracious me, Percy! Whatever do you mean, my dear?"

"Well, it says here that the Lord gave Moses two tablets."

"Mr. Preacher," said a white man to a colored minister who was addressing his congregation, "you are talking about Cain, and you say he got married in the land of Nod, after he killed Abel. But the Bible mentions only Adam and Eve as being on earth at that time. Who, then, did Cain marry?"

The colored preacher snorted with unfeigned contempt. "Huh!" he said, "you hear dat, brederen an' sisters? You hear dat fool question I am axed? Cain, he went to de land o' Nod just as de Good Book tells us, an' in de land o' Nod Cain gits so lazy an' so shif'less dat he up an' marries a gal o' one o' dem no' count pore white trash families dat de inspired apostle didn't consider fittin' to mention in de Holy Word."

BIGAMY

There once was an old man of Lyme. Who married three wives at a time: When asked, "Why a third?" He replied, "One's absurd! And bigamy, sir, is a crime."

BILLS

The proverb, "Where there's a will there's a way" is now revised to "When there's a bill we're away."

YOUNG DOCTOR--"Why do you always ask your patients what they have for dinner?"

OLD DOCTOR--"It's a most important question, for according to their menus I make out my bills."

Farmer Gray kept summer boarders. One of these, a schoolteacher, hired him to drive her to the various points of interest around the country. He pointed out this one and that, at the same time giving such items of information as he possessed.

The school-teacher, pursing her lips, remarked, "It will not be necessary for you to talk."

When her bill was presented, there was a five-dollar charge marked "Extra."

"What is this?" she asked, pointing to the item.

"That," replied the farmer, "is for sass. I don't often take it, but when I do I charge for it."--_E. Egbert_.

PATIENT (_angrily_)--"The size of your bill makes my blood boil."

DOCTOR--"Then that will be $20 more for sterilizing your system."

At the bedside of a patient who was a noted humorist, five doctors were in consultation as to the best means of producing a perspiration.

The sick man overheard the discussion, and, after listening for a few moments, he turned his head toward the group and whispered with a dry chuckle:

"Just send in your bills, gentlemen; that will bring it on at once."

"Thank Heaven, those bills are got rid of," said Bilkins, fervently, as he tore up a bundle of statements of account dated October 1st.

"All paid, eh?" said Mrs. Bilkins.

"Oh, no," said Bilkins. "The duplicates dated November 1st have come in and I don't have to keep these any longer."

BIRTHDAYS

When a man has a birthday he takes a day off, but when a woman has a birthday she takes a year off.

BLUFFING

Francis Wilson, the comedian, says that many years ago when he was a member of a company playing "She Stoops to Conquer," a man without any money, wishing to see the show, stepped up to the box-office in a small town and said:

"Pass me in, please."

The box-office man gave a loud, harsh laugh.

"Pass you in? What for?" he asked.

The applicant drew himself up and answered haughtily:

"What for? Why, because I am Oliver Goldsmith, author of the play."

"Oh, I beg your pardon, sir," replied the box-office man, as he hurriedly wrote out an order for a box.

BLUNDERS

An early morning customer in an optician's shop was a young woman with a determined air. She addressed the first salesman she saw. "I want to look at a pair of eyeglasses, sir, of extra magnifying power."

"Yes, ma'am," replied the salesman; "something very strong?"

"Yes, sir. While visiting in the country I made a very painful blunder which I never want to repeat."

"Indeed! Mistook a stranger for an acquaintance?"

"No, not exactly that; I mistook a bumblebee for a black-berry."