"Will not be at office to-day. Not home yesterday yet."
A nervous commuter on his dark, lonely way home from the railroad station heard footsteps behind him. He had an uncomfortable feeling that he was being followed. He increased his speed. The footsteps quickened accordingly. The commuter darted down a lane. The footsteps still pursued him. In desperation he vaulted over a fence and, rushing into a churchyard, threw himself panting on one of the graves.
"If he follows me here," he thought fearfully, "there can be no doubt as to his intentions."
The man behind was following. He could hear him scrambling over the fence. Visions of highwaymen, maniacs, garroters and the like flashed through his brain. Quivering with fear, the nervous one arose and faced his pursuer.
"What do you want?" he demanded. "Wh-why are you following me?"
"Say," asked the stranger, mopping his brow, "do you always go home like this? I'm going up to Mr. Brown's and the man at the station told me to follow you, as you lived next door. Excuse my asking you, but is there much more to do before we get there?"
COMPARISONS
A milliner endeavored to sell to a colored woman one of the last season's hats at a very moderate price. It was a big white picture-hat.
"Law, no, honey!" exclaimed the woman. "I could nevah wear that. I'd look jes' like a blueberry in a pan of milk."
A well-known author tells of an English spinster who said, as she watched a great actress writhing about the floor as Cleopatra:
"How different from the home life of our late dear queen!"
"Darling," whispered the ardent suitor, "I lay my fortune at your feet."
"Your fortune?" she replied in surprise. "I didn't know you had one."
"Well, it isn't much of a fortune, but it will look large besides those tiny feet."
"Girls make me tired," said the fresh young man. "They are always going to palmists to have their hands read."
"Indeed!" said she sweetly; "is that any worse than men going into saloons to get their noses red?"
A friend once wrote Mark Twain a letter saying that he was in very bad health, and concluding: "Is there anything worse than having toothache and earache at the same time?"
The humorist wrote back: "Yes, rheumatism and Saint Vitus's dance."
The Rev. Dr. William Emerson, of Boston, son of Ralph Waldo Emerson, recently made a trip through the South, and one Sunday attended a meeting in a colored church. The preacher was a white man, however, a white man whose first name was George, and evidently a prime favorite with the colored brethren. When the service was over Dr. Emerson walked home behind two members of the congregation, and overheard this conversation: "Massa George am a mos' pow'ful preacher." "He am dat."
"He's mos's pow'ful as Abraham Lincoln." "Huh! He's mo' pow'ful dan Lincoln." "He's mos' 's pow'ful as George Washin'ton." "Huh! He's mo'
pow'ful dan Washin'ton." "Massa George ain't quite as pow'ful as God."
"N-n-o, not quite. But he's a young man yet."
Is it possible your pragmatical worship should not know that the comparisons made between wit and wit, courage and courage, beauty and beauty, birth and birth, are always odious and ill taken?--_Cervantes_.
COMPENSATION
"Speakin' of de law of compensation," said Uncle Eben, "an automobile goes faster dan a mule, but at de same time it hits harder and balks longer."
COMPETITION
A new baby arrived at a house. A little girl--now fifteen--had been the pet of the family. Every one made much of her, but when there was a new baby she felt rather neglected.
"How are you, Mary?" a visitor asked of her one afternoon.
"Oh, I'm all right," she said, "except that I think there is too much competition in this world."
A farmer during a long-continued drought invented a machine for watering his fields. The very first day while he was trying it there suddenly came a downpour of rain. He put away his machine.
"It's no use," he said; "you can do nothing nowadays without competition."
COMPLIMENTS
Supper was in progress, and the father was telling about a row which took place in front of his store that morning: "The first thing I saw was one man deal the other a sounding blow, and then a crowd gathered.
The man who was struck ran and grabbed a large shovel he had been using on the street, and rushed back, his eyes blazing fiercely. I thought he'd surely knock the other man's brains out, and I stepped right in between them."
The young son of the family had become so hugely interested in the narrative as it proceeded that he had stopped eating his pudding. So proud was he of his father's valor, his eyes fairly shone, and he cried:
"He couldn't knock any brains out of you, could he, Father?"
Father looked at him long and earnestly, but the lad's countenance was frank and open.
Father gasped slightly, and resumed his supper.
_See also_ Tact.