Wit and Wisdom.

Mount Ida Chronicle, Volume XII, Issue 645, 11 February 1882, Page 1 (Supplement)

Wit and Wisdom.

Fanaticism is a great impelling power among men ; but reason is not. 1 A man calls a puppy after him by whißfcling, but a girl only has to wink at one. In what respect is an ill-bred man like lightning ? He does not know how to conduct himself.

A Frenchman remarked the other day that "pocket-picking is peculiarly an English industry." ;;." One difficulty about a chip off the old block," said Deacon Searchly, "is that it's of'en off a blockhead." _" la your mistress at homo, Jano ?" " No, sir, she is not; but she wants to know when yell be after coming again." '-!: A philosopher says—" You require in marriage precisely the same quality that you would in eating sausage—absolute confidence." Paul and Silas prayed themselves out of jail j but now-a-days folks have to swear out.

When a woman smiles at an affront, she has lost her modesty, or she seeß her revenge.

" Don't you mean to marry again, Deacon Jones?" asked Widow Simpkins. "No," growled he: " I'd rather lose what ribs I've got, than take any more." judge —" Prisoner, why will you drink? Now look at me 1 I am Bixty, and I never tasted liquor." Prisoner —"You've lost lots of fun, then, Judge, sure as you're born." Age usually makes us tolerant; for wo then do not see a fault that we have not committed.

He who can only be serious, and he who can only be merry, is but half a man. Both halves must be developed to form a real specimen.

When a bishop was commending Dryden'a translation of "Virgil," Lord Chesterfield observed: "The original is truly excellent, but' everything suffers by translation—except . bishop." ■'.'.'' Many men who claim to be self'-miultj Boom to have exercised very poor judgment in selecting the material for their own construction.

"Mr.'Boatman," said a timid woman to the ferryman who was rowing her across a river, " are people ever lost in this river ?" "Oh, no, ma'ra," he replied, "we always finds 'em again within a day or so." A sickly poet wrote an odo, entitled "Welcome Death," in which he showed what a blessed relief death would bo, and then spent the money he got for the poem in buy ing quack medicines to keep death at bay. Lancashire trainer to Oldham boy, about to run his first footrace, having pinned his coloured handkerchief through his scalp, asked, "Art o' reet?" " Ay, I think so, fc' pins into my yed. Should it be? " " Could you tell me, sir, which is the other side of the street?" On being told that it was across the way, the tight one said, "That's what I said ; but a fellow over there sent me over here." "Major, how did yees ivor lose that leg?"—" Why, Pat, one of my ancestors was au Irishman ; and all my blood that came from him was in my left leg. So I had it cut off." —"By the powers," said Pat, "it's a'pity that it hadn't settled in your head !'' Michigan has an old lady eighty-ono years 01 age, who has raised a family of eleven children, can now spin forty yards of yarn in one clay, and never ate ice cream until the last Fourth of July. That accounts for it. A Kansas schoolmistress has introduced ix new feature in her school. When one of the girls misses a word, the boy who spells it gels permission to kiss her. As a result the girs are becoming very poor spellers, while the boys are improving. Quite So.—The clergyman who tied the knot made a serious sort of speech when the cake was cut. One of the little bridesmaids, aged seven years, was asked by a younger sister to give an account of the ceremony. "Oh," said she, "we had the prayers in church and the sermon at breakfast." The late John Brougham was well known as a wit, and his replies wore always on the spur of the moment. At a banquet in New York he was seated next to Coroner Croker. A toast was proposod, and Brougham asked the coroner what he should drink it in. "Claret," said the coroner. "Claret!" was the reply. " That's no drink for a coroner. There's no body in that." No Time To Understand.—A very quick and clever child made an observation to her governess the other day which had a great deal of truth in it. "How is it, my dear," inquired the lady, "that you do not under stand this simple thing ?" "I do not know, indeed," she answered with a perplexed look ; "but I sometimes think I have so many things to learn that I have not time to understand." All the Dipjtebeitoe.—Charles Harrison, the Mayor of Chicago, says that when a man gets full of whiaky he g6es home and beats his wife, but when he gets full of beer he goes home to fall asleep, and his wife beats him. Personal.—Two friends, who wero divided in opionion as to the relative merits of a certain well-known man, were recently discussing his qualites, when one of them said, evidently thinking it a clincher : " Well, at any rate, he know's what he's talking ■about I" " Undoubtedly," replied the other, "he ought to, for lies generally talking about himself." A Clergyman's Fobgetfulneps.—Wo have tidings from Boston of a clergyman of Massachusetts who, on exchange, preached in a brother's pulpit. Taking up a note which he found when he opened the Bible, horead that Brother——requested the prayers of the Church that the loss of his wife might be blessed to him, &o. The preacher prayed most fervently. To his amazement and mortification, he found afterwards that the note had lain in the Bible a year, while the bereaved gentleman was on this Sabbath sitting with a now wife in the congregation, A Good Will Story.—That is a curious story which an American writer relates as having occurred in England many years ago. An eccentric testator left £2OOO to a friend, but with the condition that ono-half the sum should be buried with him in his coffin. The legatee took advice on tho matter. " Whore ■is the money now ?' asked his friend. In tho bank, was the reply. "AU right," said tho adviser, " write a cheque for a thousand pounds, and put it into the old gentleman's coffin, payable to his order,"