Humour.

Waikato Times, Volume XXII, Issue 1851, 17 May 1884, Page 2 (Supplement)

Humour.

"Out West" I had supposed that the far West was a new Garden of IMen, and that one had but to venture there to gain the wealth of a Monte Cristo. I met at the union station, yesterday, a man whom I imagined was by this time a bonanza king, .as he went Westward years ago. But if he is a nabob he is travelling incog., and his conversation is not calculated to stimulate Western excursions. He wore a shabby ulster, long hair and pensive, searching expression of sympathy. He greeted me as an old acquaintance at once. " Well," I queried, " how do you like the West?" " I like it just well enough," said he, " to remain in the East the remainder of my days. I tell you, the East is good enough for any rnau who hasn't a life and death dispute with the law on hand. In the East a man aboye the average in smartness can get along ; but go West and you find no drones. Every man you meet is on the dead run for wealth, and you must stay up late, rise early, and bolt your meals to keep up with the stragglers in the procession. There's lot 3 of money West, and big wage 3. I have just come from Colorado, where I got 10 dols. a day for driving a mule team. But — " " That ia a very good salary for that kind of labor ? " "Oh ! it is, is it ? Well, you go out there and see. Why, my friend, I have paid 1 dol. 50 cents for a cup of coffee, 2 dols. 75 cents, for a glass of beer, and i dols. for a hornhandled jack-knife with one blade, I have been in the mountains with a party when a chew of tobacco was put up at a raffle, at a dollar a chance; and if the winner of the tobacco finally got away with it, he had to dodge the contents of the revolvers of the party and keep out of sight for a week. Talk about the We3t to me ! It is a good place to die in ; but I propose to live from thi3 time out where the sun rises early, and there ia no corner on the luxuries of life." — Detroit F v ec Press.

Had the Proofs. A hopping mad man at the Union depot wanted to see the President, Secretary, Superintendent and treasurer all at once, and it would have done him a heap of good could he have got within striking distance of even a 20,000 dol. stockholder in any of the railroads entering Detroit. To the several queries as to what was on his mind, he finally replied : "I was coming in from Dearborn this morning, a walking on the track. My dog Bombo was with me. I've had that dog five years, and have been offered 50 dollars for him. He was a little green about railroads, but on everything else he was as sharp as a razor. We had got down about a mile this side of the village when I saw a train coming." •' And stepped aside ?" "Of course T did. I own 160 acres of land and am a Highway Commissioner, but I ain't fool 'nuff to think I'm bigger'n a railroad train." "But the dog?" 11 He stopped, too. I reckon it was the fust time he ever saw a train, but he'd have been all right if the engineer hadn't begun to toot. The minit he heard that; tootin' Bombo began to bristle, and while the train was 500 feat away he 7 started down the track to meet it."

" Then ■?" •*'*<" " Wall," said the man as he^jMllßftd his forehead, " it was a leetleL^Or^iion far "Him. -■ An engine and five cars ought to git away with a dog any day in the .yeatC -He riz , about twenty feet high, I reckon, took a slant to the left, and when he came down l^jproke *. the top off a small tree." • '- > - t "Well?" \ i " I motioned, far the engineer to -st?P 1* c train as soon as the dog started. He .could ~ havo done it, but wouldn't. ' Indeed, when the train went past me he leaned 1 out and laffed— yes, sir, laffed in myfaoe." " And you want damages ?" " I do ! I want the worth of that dog and 500 dollars for the shook to my nervous system." " Have you any proofs ?" " I should smile I Even when I'm all broke up I don't try to put the right boot on the left foot ; see that !" And he drew from his pocket a hind leg, two paws, an ear and a piece of the lost canine's tail and spread them on the benoh. There was an expressive silence in the crowd, and then the Highway Commissioner called out: " P-roofs 1 P-roofs 1 If them ain't p-roofs who be they ? Gentlemen, I never had a lawsuit nor struck a man in my life, but if. I don't take home a wad of greenbacks to settle this case the Michigan Central Road; will want a hull new board of offioers to-morrer 1".