The Jest Book Part 18

CCCXXV.--A BISHOP AND CHURCHWARDEN.

BISHOP WARBURTON, going to Cirencester to confirm, he was supplied at the altar with an elbow-chair and a cus.h.i.+on, which he did not much like, and calling to the churchwarden said, "I suppose, sir, your fattest butcher has sat in this chair, and your most violent Methodist preacher thumped the cus.h.i.+on."

CCCXXVI.--STONE BLIND.

LORD BYRON'S valet (Mr. Fletcher) grievously excited his master's ire by observing, while Byron was examining the remains of Athens, "La me, my lord, what capital _mantelpieces_ that marble would make in England!"

CCCXXVII.--AGREEABLE AND NOT COMPLIMENTARY.

IN King William's time a Mr. Tredenham was taken before the Earl of Nottingham on suspicion of having treasonable papers in his possession.

"I am only a poet," said the captive, "and those papers are my roughly-sketched play." The Earl examined the papers, however, and then returned them, saying, "I have heard your statement and read your play, and as I can find _no trace_ of _a plot_ in either, you may go free."

CCCXXVIII.--DR. JOHNSON WITHOUT VARIATION.

DR. JOHNSON was observed by a musical friend of his to be extremely inattentive at a concert, whilst a celebrated solo player was running up the divisions and sub-divisions of notes upon his violin. His friend, to induce him to take greater notice of what was going on, told him how extremely difficult it was. "Difficult, do you call it, sir?" replied the doctor; "I wish it were _impossible_."

CCCXXIX.--MR. CANNING'S PARASITES.

NATURE descends down to infinite smallness. Mr. Canning has his parasites; and if you take a large buzzing blue-bottle fly, and look at it in a microscope, you may see twenty or thirty little ugly insects crawling about it, which doubtless think their fly to be the bluest, grandest, merriest, most important animal in the universe, and are convinced that the world would be at an end if it ceased to buzz.--S.S.

CCCx.x.x.--PLEASANT DESERTS.

A CERTAIN physician was so fond of administering medicine, that, seeing all the phials and pill-boxes of his patient completely emptied, and ranged in order on the table, he said, "Ah, sir, it gives me pleasure to attend you,--you _deserve_ to be ill."

CCCx.x.xI.--A HOME ARGUMENT.

BY one decisive argument Tom gained his lovely Kate's consent, To fix the bridal day.

"Why in such haste, dear Tom, to wed?

I shall not change my mind," she said.

"But then," says he, "I _may_."

CCCx.x.xII.--A BAD PEN.

"NATURE has written 'honest man' on his face," said a friend to Jerrold, speaking of a person in whom Jerrold's faith was not altogether blind.

"Humph!" Jerrold replied, "then the pen must have been a very bad one."

CCCx.x.xIII.--WIGNELL THE ACTOR.

ONE of old Mr. Sheridan's favorite characters was _Cato_: and on its revival at Covent Garden Theatre, a Mr. Wignell a.s.sumed his old-established part of _Portius_; and having stepped forward with a prodigious though accustomed strut, began:--

"The dawn is overcast; the morning lowers, And heavily, in clouds, brings on the day."

The audience upon this began to vociferate "Prologue! prologue!

prologue!" when Wignell, finding them resolute, without betraying any emotion, pause, or change in his voice and manner, proceeded as if it were part of the play:--

"Ladies and gentlemen, there has been no Prologue spoken to this play these twenty years-- The great, the important day, big with the fate Of Cato and of Rome."

This wonderful effusion put the audience in good humor: they laughed immoderately, clapped, and shouted "_Bravo_!" and Wignell still continued with his usual composure and stateliness.

CCCx.x.xIV.--CANDOR.

A NOTORIOUS egotist, indirectly praising himself for a number of good qualities which it was well known he had not, asked Macklin the reason why he should have this propensity of interfering in the good of others when he frequently met with very unsuitable returns. "The cause is plain enough," said Macklin; "_impudence_,--nothing but stark-staring impudence!"

CCCx.x.xV.--A "COLD" COMPLIMENT.

A c.o.xCOMB, teasing Dr. Parr with an account of his petty ailments, complained that he could never go out without catching cold in his head.

"No wonder," returned the doctor; "you always go out without _anything_ in it."

CCCx.x.xVI.--READY REPLY.

THE gra.s.s-plots in the college courts or quadrangles are not for the unhallowed feet of the under-graduates. Some, however, are hardy enough to venture, in despite of all remonstrance. A master of Trinity had often observed a student of his college invariably to cross the green, when, in obedience to the calls of his appet.i.te, he went to hall to dine. One day the master determined to reprove the delinquent for invading the rights of his superiors, and for that purpose he threw up the sash at which he was sitting, and called to the student,--"Sir, I never look out of my window but I see you walking across the gra.s.s-plot". "My lord," replied the offender instantly, "I never walk across the gra.s.s-plot, but I _see you_ looking out of your window." The master, pleased at the readiness of the reply, closed his window, convulsed with laughter.

CCCx.x.xVII.--FULL PROOF.

LORD PETERBOROUGH was once taken by the mob for the great Duke of Marlborough (who was then in disgrace with them); and being about to be roughly treated, said,--"Gentlemen, I can convince you by two reasons that I am not the Duke of Marlborough. In the first place, I have only _five guineas_ in my pocket; and in the second, they are heartily at your service." He got out of their hands with loud huzzas and acclamations.

CCCx.x.xVIII.--EPIGRAM ON CIBBER.

IN merry Old England it once was the rule, The king had his poet and also his fool; But now we're so frugal, I'd have you to know it, That Cibber can serve both for _fool_ and for _poet_.

CCCx.x.xIX.--A PROPHECY.

CHARLES MATHEWS, the elder, being asked what he was going to do with his son (the young man's profession was to be that of an architect), "Why,"

answered the comedian, "he is going to _draw houses_, like his father."

CCCXL.--A FIXTURE.

DR. ROGER LONG, the celebrated astronomer, was walking, one dark evening, with a gentleman in Cambridge, when the latter came to a short post fixed in the pavement, but which, in the earnestness of conversation, taking to be a boy standing in the path, he said hastily, "Get out of the way, boy."--"That boy," said the doctor, very seriously, "is a _post-boy_, who never turns out of the way for anybody."

CCCXLI.--FAMILY PRIDE.