ODDS AND ENDS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XXV, Issue 8986, 25 February 1888, Page 4 (Supplement)

ODDS AND ENDS.

" Although unseen, my influence is felt," remarked the lively flea. The best thing in ladies' purses this season— some of them are simply elegant—is money. What in a woman is called " curiosity" in a man is grandiloquently magnified into a " spirit of inquiry. A young widow never knows how much, or how little, she loved her departed old husband until the will is read.

She : "Lan 1 ob de liben ! brudder Eli 1 Did you come on de kyars or by private conweyance?" "He: Private conveyance, chilel walked !"

Pastor: " How Ido regret, my dear madam, to see you wearing these sad habiliments of woe !" Widow : " 'M —ye-es. Black never did did suit me !"

Someone has written a book on " How to Save Money." No use. The only way to save money is not to spend it, and that knocks all the fun out of saving. "We married women seldom have to apply to the court for a mandamus," said an Oil City lady. "And why is it?" asked a gentleman. "We who have husbands have one often enough." A stump orator wanted the wings of a bird to fly to every village and hamlet in the broad land ; but he collapsed when a man in the crowd sang out: " You'd get shot for a goose before you flew a mile." "Say, didn't you tell me when you sold me that dog that he was a bird dog ?" " Yes, that is what I said." " Well, you swindled me. That dog won't hunt." " I didn't say he would hunt. He's a bird dog. Cook the birds for him. That's the way he likes them best."

A good story is told of Butler's sarcastic retort upon a judge, whom he was teasing for a ruling favourable to a cause he was defending in court. The judge got out of patience at last, and somewhat testily exclaimed : Mr. Butler, what do you think I sit here for?" The counsel quietly shrugged his shoulders, and replied : " The Court has got me now." " One night a man gave a five-dollar gold piece by mistake for a nickel," said the street car conductor who belongs to the Emerald Beneficial Association. "He came down to the barns on the run-in, and I fished his shiner out of my nickel pocket for him. He was only a poor clerk in a grocery, but he gave me 50 cents. Another uay I restored 159 dollars which a woman had left in the car. She never even said 'Thank you.' That's the woman of it!" The story is going the rounds of a cowboy of the Wild West show who went into a London restaurant and ordered a steak, which was brought to him exceedingly rare. He looked at it a moment, then drew his revolver, and blazed away at the meat. Of course these was a panic, and the police came about the time that the revolver had been emptied. " What on earth do you mean by this conduct ?" asked the proprietor. " What do I mean, pard ?" answered the gowboy. " Why," pointing to the almost raw steak, " I wanted to kill the blamed thing." A Yankee having told an Englishman that he shot on one particular occasion 1)99 snipe, his interlocutor asked him why he didn't make it 1000 sit once. "No," said he ; " it's not likely I'm going to tell a lie for one snipe." Whereupon the English man, determined not to be outdone, began to tell a story of a man having swam from Liverpool to Boston. " Did you see him yourselfasked the Yankee, suddenly. " Why, yes, of course I did ; I was coming across and our vessel passed him a mile out of Boston Harbour." " Well, I'm glad yer saw him, stranger, 'cos yer a witness that I did it. That was me."

Among the crowd of jurors in a New York city court asking to be excused was one man who, despite the efforts of the attendants to restrain him, insisted on advancing to the judge's desk and speaking privately with him. The judge, noticing his importunity, signified his willingness to allow the talesman to approach, and then said to him somewhat sternly : "Well, sir ; what is it ?" The man leaned over the bench until his lips almost touched the judge's ear, and then whispered I've got the itch." The crowded court-room was watching the result with curiosity. " Mr. Clerk," said the judge, instantly, without the slightest change of expression, and in a voice painfully loud and distinct—" Mr. Clerk, he's got the itch. Scratch him off the list."