The Jest Book<br />The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings by Mark Lemon (christmas read aloud TXT) 📗

A gentleman, inquiring of Jack Bannister respecting a[Pg 40] man who had been hanged, was told that he was dead. "And did he continue in the grocery line?" said the former. "Oh no," replied Jack; "he was quite in a different line when he died."

At an evening party, Jerrold was looking at the dancers. Seeing a very tall gentleman waltzing with a remarkably short lady, he said to a friend at hand, "Humph! there's the mile dancing with the mile-stone."

Sir William B—— being at a parish meeting, made some proposals, which were objected to by a farmer. Highly enraged, "Sir," says he to the farmer, "do you know, sir, that I have been at the two universities, and at two colleges in each university?"—"Well, sir," said the farmer, "what of that? I had a calf that sucked two cows, and the observation I made was, the more he sucked, the greater calf he grew."

It was said of one that remembered everything that he lent, but nothing that he borrowed, "that he had lost half of his memory."

When the late Lord Campbell married Miss Scarlett, and departed on his wedding trip, Mr. Justice Abbott observed, when a cause was called on in the Bench, "I thought, Mr. Brougham, that Mr. Campbell was in this case?"—"Yes, my lord," replied Brougham, "but I understand he is ill—suffering from Scarlett fever."

The copiousness of the English language perhaps was never more apparent than in the following character, by a lady, of her own husband:—

"He is," says she, "an abhorred, barbarous, capricious,[Pg 41] detestable, envious, fastidious, hard-hearted, illiberal, ill-natured, jealous, keen, loathsome, malevolent, nauseous, obstinate, passionate, quarrelsome, raging, saucy, tantalizing, uncomfortable, vexatious, abominable, bitter, captious, disagreeable, execrable, fierce, grating, gross, hasty, malicious, nefarious, obstreperous, peevish, restless, savage, tart, unpleasant, violent, waspish, worrying, acrimonious, blustering, careless, discontented, fretful, growling, hateful, inattentive, malignant, noisy, odious, perverse, rigid, severe, teasing, unsuitable, angry, boisterous, choleric, disgusting, gruff, hectoring, incorrigible, mischievous, negligent, offensive, pettish, roaring, sharp, sluggish, snapping, snarling, sneaking, sour, testy, tiresome, tormenting, touchy, arrogant, austere, awkward, boorish, brawling, brutal, bullying, churlish, clamorous, crabbed, cross, currish, dismal, dull, dry, drowsy, grumbling, horrid, huffish, insolent, intractable, irascible, ireful, morose, murmuring, opinionated, oppressive, outrageous, overbearing, petulant, plaguy, rough, rude, rugged, spiteful, splenetic, stern, stubborn, stupid, sulky, sullen, surly, suspicious, treacherous, troublesome, turbulent, tyrannical, virulent, wrangling, yelping dog-in-a-manger."

A medical student under examination, being asked the different effects of heat and cold, replied: "Heat expands and cold contracts."—"Quite right; can you give me an example?"—"Yes, sir, in summer, which is hot, the days are longer; but in winter, which is cold, the days are shorter."

Happiness grows at our own firesides, and is not to be picked in strangers' gardens.

It was said of a work (which had been inspected by a severe critic), in terms which at first appeared very flattering, "There is a great deal in this book which is new, and a great deal that is true." So far good, the author would[Pg 42] think; but then came the negation: "But it unfortunately happens, that those portions which are new are not true, and those which are true are not new!"

A gentleman waited upon Jerrold one morning to enlist his sympathies in behalf of a mutual friend, who was constantly in want of a round sum of money.

"Well," said Jerrold, who had contributed on former occasions, "how much does —— want this time?"

"Why, just a four and two noughts will, I think, put him straight," the bearer of the hat replied.

Jerrold.—"Well, put me down for one of the noughts this time."

An old man of ninety having recovered from a very dangerous illness, his friends congratulated him, and encouraged him to get up. "Alas!" said he to them, "it is hardly worth while to dress myself again."

At Hawick, the people used to wear wooden clogs, which made a clanking noise on the pavement. A dying old woman had some friends by her bedside, who said to her, "Weel, Jenny, ye are gaun to Heeven, an' gin you should see our folks, ye can tell them that we're a weel." To which Jenny replied. "Weel, gin I shud see them I 'se tell them, but you manna expect that I am to gang clank clanking through Heeven looking for your folk."

Sir Fletcher Norton was noted for his want of courtesy. When pleading before Lord Mansfield on some question of manorial right, he chanced unfortunately to say, "My lord, I can illustrate the