Wit and Humour.

Patea Mail, 26 May 1882, Page 2 (Supplement)

Wit and Humour.

Attention. —Even the most expert riflemen are fond of misses. “ Excuse me for the liberty I take,” as the convict remarked when he escaped from prison. The billiard-player is not an imitator. He takes the cue from no man. He takes it from the rack. A Coubt Theatre Ticket.—The Order of the Garter available only at Windsor as an Order for the Stalls. Thbeb feet make a yard, very true j but two feet unmake it mighty quick, providing they are hen’s feet. It is certainly a reflection on the appre ciative taste of the bride that the best man at a wedding is not the bridegroom. A Sexton, recently arrived from Warsaw, has been engaged by the telegraph department on account of his experience in planting “Why don’t you dress as well as your clerks ?” was asked the other day. •* I can’t,” was the answer ; “ they can get trusted.” As a proof that hens have delicate aesthetic sense it is remarked that they always seem to wipe their feet when they enter a flower garden. We are much indebted to experience, and it is truly said that we learn most from our mistakes. This is the reason compositors know so much. It must be they’ve learned sheep in Texas, for a farmer in Travis advertises for “an industrious man, to take general charge of 5000 sheep who can talk Spanish.” It is said that at learning to swim women are quicker than men. This is probably because the custom of wearing trails has learned them to kick out gracefully. Cheap editions of Scott’s Work.—There was a .Romancer, Miss Braddon; her brain a queer notion she had on—to boil Walter Scott down to rags in a pot, then serve for a penny. Oh, mad ’un! In her advertisement the lady principal of a school mentioned her lady-assistant and the “ reputation for teaching which she bears,” but the printer left out the “which’ so the advertisement went forth commending the lady’s “ reputation for teaching she bears.” A young lady, at an examination in gram mar was asked “ why the noun bachelor was singular.” She replied immediately, “ Because it is very singular they don’t get married.” “ Have some milk this morning ?” asked the milkman of Toozer, who stood at the back-door. “ Ho, not this milk, some udder milk,” said the little one. And the milkman walked a chalk-line away from the house. The father of a St. Louis bride presented his son-in-law with 80,000 head of cattle. " Papa dear,” exclaimed his daughter when she heard of it, “ that was so kind of you; Charley’s awfully fond of ox tail soup.” A millionaire, who was looking at a level tract of land which he had just bought at an extravagant price, said to the agent who had sold it to him “I do admire a rich green flat.” “do do I,” significantly replied the agent.

Tab next man who gets out a dictionary should not neglect to put in a few words that will rhyme with October. The dictionaries now in the marketare very deficient in this respect. “ Knocked ober ”is about the best the poet can do at present. Real genius is not only modest in behaviour, but humble in spirit. It looks upward in reverence, not downward in acorn. It has no disposition to vaunt its own achievements, knowing how far they fall short of even its own conceptions. It is only the inferior mind that tries to push itself into notice.

The Advance of Science.—“ I’m sure," said “ Judy’s ” laundress to the Ever-lovely One the other day, “ what with them telephones, the ’lectric light, the march of civilisation, and the advance of science, as the sayin’ is, I don’t know mhat the world’s a-cornin’ to. Why, ma’am, there’s my daughter Maria, why, she tells me as she curls her hair now with the ‘ Telegraph.’ ” " Ant good shooting on . your farm ?” asked the hunter of the farmer. “ Splendid,” replied the agriculturist; “ there is a drive well man down in the clover meadow, a cloth pedlar at the house, a candidate out in the barn, and two tramps down in the stock-yard. Climb right over the fence, young man, load both barrels, and sail in.”