THE LAUGHTER-BOX.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1247, 23 January 1896, Page 23

THE LAUGHTER-BOX.

DOMESTIC STRATEGY. When a Newtown New Woman came down to breakfast one morning last week £&>'©’ found a most delicious meal awaiting: her. Her husband’s bread had never berem lighter or flakier, The coffee bad neverbeen so fragrant in aroma, so delicious to* the taste. The beefsteak was grilled just as she liked it, and it was as tender as the affection of her own tender and loving husband. “ Ah!” she said, as she laid aside her napkin, and prepared to leave the table, “ a breakfast like this fortifies one for the> day’s duties. Now a good, sweet, good-bye kiss from ray dear husband, and I am gone.” He put his arms about her neck, and looked up into her face as she kissed him, and then he cooed : “My beloved, I just adore you ! Oh, why do you have to go to the horrid office on Lambton quay ? Why can’t you stay here at home with me, where I can look upon your sweet face, and feel your kisses upon my lips r'" The New Woman smiled an indulgent smile as she replied : “ That would be very nice, but life is something more than hugs and kisses, you. know. 1 must go and perform my part in the great world of business, while my dear little husband, in his sheltered home nest, attends to his domestic duties.”

And will you think of me while you are down town?” he asked.

“ Certainly I shall.” she replied. “ Dearest,” he said. “Well, love?” “ I am in such need of a new pair of trousers, dear. If you could spare me 25s this morning, I “ Why, certainly,” she replied, taking out her purse. “ Here is the money. Get. yourself a real nice pair.” As the New Woman seized the railing of the rear platform of a passing tram car and drew herself on board, she said to herself :

“ I thought it very strange if that good breakfast and all that mollycoddling didn’t mean that cash was wanted for some sort of toggery or other.” As her husband put on his hat and sallied forth to do a little shopping, he said to himself : “ When a man wants a little money it is much better to use a little strategy than to ask a wife bluntly for cash, as some men do.” A DOG-SHARK’S RETENGE. “ No, I haven’t been fishing this sunsmer,” replied the man with the glass eye, -when the query was put to him at the hotel. “ I quit fishing five years ago, and I shall probably never land another bass." “ Down on your luck as a fisherist ?” was asked. “ No, not exactly. As a matter of fact I used to have extraordinary luck in fishing. It was an accident that disgusted me with the sport, and the same accident caused m« the loss of this left eye and laid me up fori several months.” On being urged to spin his yarn inf sighed heavily, took out and wiped and placed his glass eye, and then said : “ I was living down on the east shore of Maryland, where the fishing is just immense, and was having more than my shara of luck, when a fellow came down from New Jersey, and we got to be chummy. After a bit he let on that ho was an electrician, and had invented a fish killing torpedo. The torpedo was to be lowered into the water and exploded from an electric battery in the boat, and the explosion was warranted to turn up a boatload of dead fish. I didn’t like the idea at all, but the thing was intended for market fishermen, ami the inventor prevailed upon mo to go out with him one afternoon and see how tha old thing worked.” “ Well ?” was queried, as the glass-ey® man made a long pause. “Ah. Beg pardon. Yes. I went out with him, and by-and-bve we dropped the thing overboard to let it trail away behind us about a hundred feet and then explode it. We had some little trouble with the battery, and unbeknown to us the tide floated the torpedo back under the boat. When the explosion came the skill was reduced to matchwood, and we wont sailing into the air. The toi'pedo man came down to go to the bottom and stay there, and I was rescued just at the last gasp.” “ Did the explosion kill any fish ?” “ Not a one.” “ Your eye was lost in the explosion, of course ?” “ No, sir. I wasn’t hurt at all by the explosion, nor in going up or coming down. It was while swimming in the water that a dog-fish came up on my left side, glared at me for a moment, and then deliberately turned round and stuck his tail into my i eye aud gouged it out.” m “ Y"ou don’t mean it,” gasped one of group. “ I mean every word of it, sir. The of course, was to get even with me for torpedo business, and this was fully plished. Yes, he made me a for life, and is it any wonder that longer care for the sport which interested me so much ?” We looked at him for a long, long in silence, and he closed his good eye glared with the other at the diamond stud on the bosom of the advance theatri-jl cal agent. By-and-bye he rose up and said: “ I had forgotten to say that after gouging out my eye the dog-shark swept Ilia tail over my head and removed all the hair from my poll, thus rendering me baldheaded as well. I received from my mother in Boston to-day a new pocket Bible to. replace the one I lost a few weeks asm, and if you gentlemen will excuse me I will gdT to my room and read a few chapters befoi® ; turning in for the night.” N