ODDS and ENDS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LIII, Issue 16169, 4 March 1916, Page 7 (Supplement)

ODDS and ENDS.

i I —, ——_ ml Teacheu: "What is water?' Willie: I * ■" A colourless fluid that turns black when !;•; you wash your hands." !"Why aro you asking me for help? Haven't you any close relatives?" "Yes. That's the reason why I'm appealing to yon." Binks : " How aro you to-day— feeling pretty strong':" .links': "No; only just managing to keep out of the grave." Links: "(Jli, I'm sorry to hear that." " Husband, I want three ostrich plumes. Sii pqunds will buy them." "But I haven't six pounds to spare, my angel." '■ Rah 1 You call me an angel and then reluso to buy mo a few feathers." Tho following is a copy of a bill posted on the walls of a country village: "A lecture on total abstinence will be JeiUvred in the open air, and a collection will bo niado at tho door to defray expenses." " How are tho plans of your new house coming along?" " Splendidly. My wife has finally laid out. all the cupboards she wants, and now all the architect's got to do is to build the house around them." Teacher: "It is a well-known natural phenomenon that heat expands, and cold I'Utracts. Give mo an instance!" Pupil: "Please, sir,,tho holidays. In summer tl-ev last six weeks, in winter only two."' One Sunday morning a minister's wife saw her .-on ilia.-ins; the hens with a stick. She went to the door to investigate, and heard him say. "I'll teach you to lay ~£-5 in a minister's family on Sunday morning." First Workman : "Do you understand (his question of capital and labour?" Second Workman: "Well, it's this way. If vou lent mo ten bob that would be capital and labour would he the trouble you would have in getting it all back again." Mrs. Hunter (to shopman): "If you will cut me a small sample of this I will find out from mv dressmaker how many yards I need, and can send for tho goods by post," Little Willie: "Why, mamma, that's just what you said in all the other shops." " I bought my wife tho finest kind of an arrangement for long motor rides. " What is it?" "A sort of trap to wear over her mouth, called a dust-protector. " Does it work!" " I don't know about the dust pan of it, but it keeps her from talking." Mis'? Prism: "Don't let your dog bite me, little bow" Little Boy: "He Wt bite, ma'am.*' Miss Prism: "But he is showing his teeth." Little Boy (with pride) "Certainly he is, ma'am, and » you had as good teeth as he has you'd show 'em, too." » " What is vour occupation o» calling ?" a<ked a magistrate of a wretched-looking man in tie deck, who was charged with mendicancy. "Inventor," was the reply in a hoarse voice. What have you invented?" asked the magistrate. "Nothing " said the prisoner, " but I'm trying to?** An old man-servant, who had been found by his master to be deficient in his account, blamed the butcher for tampering with his book. The gentleman of the house remomstrated by saying: " But, Tom, figures don't lie. "No, answered tie old man, "but , liars often figger-" m "You never read the weather predictions?" "No," answered Farmer Jenkins ' "I skip 'em for two reasons. One is that there's no use o' worryin' about what vera can't help, an' the other is that yob never can rely on a prophecy till after it's come true, and then its too 4 late to make any difference." THOUGHTFUL PSOVIDENOE. Bacon: "The giraffe is said to be the only animal in nature that is entirely dumb, not being able to express itself by any sound." . .. Egbert: "It's just as Tell, lor if it could speak it would talk over everybody's head." ONE MOEB QUESTION. Precocious Offspring: ( ''Pa, may I ask ■just one more question ?" Patient Pater: "Yes, my eon. Just jane more." Precocious Offspring: "Well, then, pa, how is it that the night falls, but jfs'ths day that breaks?" ALWAYS. George Ade has just given another excuse for being a bachelor. He says: "The reason, why I've never married is that, at a wedding I attended in early youth, the minister said nervously at the end— I have feared ever since that there may have been truth in his words— f'l believe it is always kistomary to puss the bride.'" POINTED EVIDENCE. Little Clara's parents often discuss reincarnation, and the small maiden has acquired some of the phraseology. " Mamma," she said one day, "my kitten must have been a paper of pins in a previous state of existence. "Why do you think so?" asked her piother. "Because I can feel some of them in |ier toes yet," was the logical reply. SQUARING ACCOUNTS. The young man just out of college gets a good many hard knocks, both from hardheaded business men and the humour columns of the newspapers. Here is a story which helps to balance the account:— "So you've just graduated from college?" snapped the head of the firm. "And I suppose you think you know enough to run the business if I give you a place?" " I hadn't considered that phase of the matter," replied the graduate. " I called to inform you that I have combined all vour rivals, and am willing to let you into the combination if you will talk business." A SMALL CALCULATION. The manager of an engineering works was watching an apprentice who was swinging the hammer in a leisurely way. "Look here, my boy," he said, going up to the youth and taking the hammer from him. "when I see a man that takes his hammer by the end of the handle and strikes a proper blow like that I g:ve that man 32s a week : but a man who takes it in the middle like this, only gets 25s a week, and is dismissed whenever we get •Jack. See?" . , ' „ , . Hoping he had sufficiently well driven home his point, he surveyed the lad, more in sorrow than in anger. But the latter requested an extension of the lesson. '• Please, sir," said he, "where ought I to hold it for my 4s a week !" A "SOFT" ANSWER. Ellen stopped scrubbing the steps long enough to cast an admiring eye on her employer's garden. " Sure, they are fine posies ye have, doctor," she said. " I've a neat little house I bought with the money Td -fit by. and an elegant garden it had last year, too, but now there's neither siick nor stalk in it." "What was it, hens or dogs?" asked the doctor, sympathetically mentioning his own aversions. " Sure me neighbour—bad luck to her— had a ditch dug in her land, and the water ran down into me ] garden, and washed all me seeds away." "And what did yon do about it'" "What could a poor lone body like me do?" "Well, didn't you at least say something to the woman, complain or tell her that you wouldn't stand it ?" " flow doctor, dear, hard words just leads to'bad feelings among neighbours, and that ye know as well as I do: and it's not me that would be using them. So I only said to her, '.I hope I'll live to see the floods Bowing over your graves a* ' your ditch-waters have flowed ) over me gar- >. den, and I let it go at that.' "