Josh Billings Interviewed.

Waikato Times, Volume XXIV, Issue 1961, 31 January 1885, Page 2 (Supplement)

Josh Billings Interviewed.

" Josii Biltjnoh " is spending the summer at Saratago. He ha 3 with him his daughter, Mr*. Jose Y. Sant-ana, with her husband and children, from Caracas Venezuela, and he id «b happy as anjbody can be with his perverted ideas of orthography. One of his " numerous admirers " called upon this social philosopher at his sylvan retreat, as soon as he was fairly settled and had his laros and penates in order, and drew from him the following nuggets of wisdom, which may be stated in catechetical form, somewhat as follows:— 11 What is your favorite piece of sculpture? " The Milestone Nearest Home." " Ate you in favor of woman's rights ? " " I am ; but she can pet more rights out of him by trusting to his gallantry than by trying to ont-arguc and out-vote him." " How do you define humor ? " 14 Humor, when genuine, is a tnppy mixture of truth and pathos." " What do yon think of interviewers ? _ " Clever fellows— perhaps necessary evils.' •' What do you think of the noble red man, and the schemes for elevating him ? " " I h»T6 a Tcry dilated opinion of th« Indiang. I have lived among them. An Indian ha 3 but two traits of oharacter— one is cruelty, the other is deceit— and the only way to civilise those traits is with a minie ball. A. civilivd Indian is of no more use in this world than a tame deer." 11 Have yon any faith in weather prophets ?" ■ " I look upon all prophets in these days as oronkn, who believe four times as much as they oan prove, and who can prove four times as muoh a* anyone else believes. No man has a right to be a prophet unless he ia a good gneaqer. Prophesying don't pay. If you get it right, nn one remembers it ; if you get it wrong, no one forgets it." "What is brevity?" "Brevity h the long and short of it." 11 What do you oonsidpr your own position among humorous writer?" " I am simply a paragraphic, with .possibly a faculty for condensation. I have discovered that if I can't say a thing in one or two lines, I can't say it at all." 11 What is your opinion of evolution ?" " I don't think much of it. I doja't think that Nature had to make a monkey before the conld make a man. And, then, if man did spring from the monkey, where did the monkey come from ? Those things bother me." " llow do you regard infidel* and in* fidelity ?" " I would rather bi tin idiot than an infidel. If I am an idiot, God mado me one ; if an infidel, I have made myself one. A man may learn infidelity from books or from his associates, but he can't learn it from his mother nor from tho works of God aronnd him. — Botton Herald.