The Jest Book Part 46

DCCCXII.--MAC READY TO CALL.

IN the time of Sir John Macpherson's Indian government, most of his staff consisted of Scotch gentlemen, whose names began with Mac. One of the aides-de-camp used to call the government-house _Almack's_, "For,"

said he, "if you stand in the middle of the court, and call _Mac_, you will have a head popped out of every window."

DCCCXIII.--EPIGRAM.

(On the oiled and perfumed ringlets of a certain Lord.)

OF miracles this is _sans doute_ the most rare, I ever perceived, heard reported, or read; A man with abundance of _scents_ in his _hair_, Without the least atom of _sense_ in his _head_.

DCCCXIV.--LOOK-A-HEAD.

A TORY member declared the extent of the Reform Bill positively made the hair of members on his side the house to stand on end. On the ensuing elections, they will find the Bill to have a still greater effect on the _state of the poll_.

G. A'B.

DCCCXV.--THE BIRTH OF A PRINCE.

JERROLD was at a party when the Park guns announced the birth of a prince. "How they do powder these babies!" Jerrold exclaimed.

DCCCXVI.--SETTING HIM UP TO KNOCK HIM DOWN.

TOM MOORE, observing himself to be eyed by two handsome young ladies, inquired of a friend, who was near enough to hear their remarks, what it was they said of him. "Why, the taller one observed that she was delighted to have had the pleasure of seeing so famous a personage."--"Indeed!" said the gratified poet, "anything more?"--"Yes: she said she was the more pleased because she had taken in _your_ celebrated '_Almanac_' for the last five or six years!"

DCCCXVII.--BRIEF CORRESPONDENCE.

MRS. FOOTE, mother of Aristophanes, experienced the caprice of fortune nearly as much as her son. The following laconic letters pa.s.sed between them: "Dear Sam, I am in prison."--Answer: "Dear mother, so am I."

DCCCXVIII.--MAN-TRAPS.

IT being unlawful to set man-traps and spring-guns, a gentleman once hit upon a happy device. He was a scholar, and being often asked the meaning of mysterious words compounded from the Greek, that appear in every day's newspaper, and finding they always excited wonder by their length and sound, he had painted on a board, and put up on his premises, in very large letters, the following: "_Tondapamubomenos set up in these grounds_." It was perfectly a "patent safety."

DCCCXIX.--A COLORABLE EXCUSE.

A LADY who painted her face, asked Parsons how he thought she looked. "I can't tell, madam," he replied, "except you _uncover_ your face."

DCCCXX.--CONSISTENCY.

NO wonder Tory landlords flout "Fixed Duty," for 'tis plain With them the Anti-Corn-Law Bill Must go against the grain.

DCCCXXI.--A WONDERFUL CURE.

DOCTOR HILL, a notorious wit, physician, and man of letters, having quarrelled with the members of the Royal Society, who had refused to admit him as an a.s.sociate, resolved to avenge himself. At the time that Bishop Berkeley had issued his work on the marvellous virtues of tar-water, Hill addressed to their secretary a letter purporting to be from a country-surgeon, and reciting the particulars of a cure which he had effected. "A sailor," he wrote, "_broke_ his leg, and applied to me for help. I bound together the broken portions, and washed them with the celebrated _tar-water_. Almost immediately the sailor felt the beneficial effects of this remedy, and it was not long before his leg was completely _healed_!" The letter was read, and discussed at the meetings of the Royal Society, and caused considerable difference of opinion. Papers were written for and against the tar-water and the restored leg, when a second letter arrived from the (pretended) country pract.i.tioner:--"In my last I omitted to mention that the broken limb of the sailor was a _wooden leg_!"

DCCCXXII.--AN ACCOMMODATING PHYSICIAN.

"IS there anything the matter with you?" said a physician to a person who had sent for him. "O dear, yes, I am ill all over, but I don't know what it is, and I have no particular pain nowhere," was the reply. "Very well," said the doctor, "I'll give you something to _take away all that_."

DCCCXXIII.--CHOICE SPIRITS.

AN eminent spirit-merchant in Dublin announced, in one of the Irish papers, that he has still a small quant.i.ty of the whiskey on sale _which was drunk by his late Majesty while in Dublin_.

DCCCXXIV.--AN EXPLANATION.

YOUNG, the author of "Night Thoughts," paid a visit to Potter, son of Archbishop Potter, who lived in a deep and dirty part of Kent, through which Young had scrambled with some difficulty and danger. "Whose field was that I crossed?" asked Young, on reaching his friend. "Mine," said Potter. "True," replied the poet; "Potter's field _to bury_ strangers in."

DCCCXXV.--IMPROMPTU BY R.B. SHERIDAN.

LORD ERSKINE having once a.s.serted, in the presence of Lady Erskine and Mr. Sheridan, that a wife was only a tin canister tied to one's tail, Sheridan at once presented her these lines,--

Lord Erskine at woman presuming to rail, Calls a wife "a tin canister tied to one's tail;"

And fair Lady Anne, while the subject he carries on, Seems hurt at his lords.h.i.+p's degrading comparison.

But wherefore "degrading?" Considered aright, A canister's useful, and polished, and bright; And should dirt its original purity hide, 'Tis the fault of the puppy to whom it is tied.

DCCCXXVI.--LAW AND PHYSIC.

A LEARNED judge being asked the difference between law and equity courts, replied, "At common law you are done for at once: at equity, you are not so easily disposed of. One is _prussic acid_, and the other _laudanum_."

DCCCXXVII.--IMPROMPTU.

COUNSELLOR (afterwards Chief Justice) BUSHE, being on one occasion asked which of a company of actors he most admired, maliciously replied, "The _prompter_, sir, for I have heard the most and seen the least _of him_."

DCCCXXVIII.--NOTIONS OF HAPPINESS.

"WERE I but a _king_," said a country boy, "I would _eat_ my fill of fat bacon, and _swing_ upon a gate all day long."

DCCCXXIX.--A FORGETFUL MAN.

WHEN Jack was poor, the lad was frank and free.

Of late he's grown brimful of pride and pelf; No wonder that he don't remember _me_; Why so? you see he has forgot _himself_.