Dismally Failed.

Manawatu Herald, 3 December 1898, Page 2

Dismally Failed.

Mark Twain tells a very funny story of himself. Just previous to giving a lecture, a young man spoke to him - about his uncle. "No, sir; he hasn't laughed for thirty years. It is a sad case." Mark Twain was profoundly moved* and said : " My son, bring the old party, round. I have got some jokes in that lecture that will make him laugh, if there is any laugh in him ; and if they miss fire, I have some others that wifl make him cry or kill him, one or the other." Then the young man thanked me (said the famous humorist) and went after his uncle. He placed him in full view in the second row, and I began on him. I tried him with mild jokes, • then with severe ones; I dosed him with bad jokes, and riddled him with good ones ; I fired old stale jokes into him and peppered him fore and aft with red-hot new ones ; I warmed up to my work, and assaulted him on the right and left, in front and behind ; I fumed and ranted till I was hoarse, and ill, and frantic, and furious ; but 1 never moved him onee — I never started a smile or tear, never a ghost of a smile, and never a suspicion of moisture. I was astounded. I closed the lee* ture at last with one despairing shriek, with one wild burst of humour, and hurled a joke of supernatural atrocity full at him. Then I sat down, bewildered and' exhausted. The chairman of the evening came up and said : " What made you carry on so towards the last ?" " I was trying to make that old idiot in the second row laugh." '•Well." was the chairman's reply, "you were altogether wasting your time, because he is deaf and dumb, and as blind as a mole 1"