Palmer Cox

“ In the Office of the Librarian of Congress at Washington, D. C.
iii
v PUBLISHERS’ PREFACE. Not only is truth stranger than fiction, but it is funnier also. Just as some men have no eye for colors, but are color blind; so some men have no eye for fun, but are fun blind. Happy is the man who can see the humor which bubbles up in daily life; doubly happy he who, having seen, can tell the fun to others and so spread the glad contagion of a laugh; but thrice happy is the man who, having seen, can tell the fun ”

“ Then we hold our breath, as we see the pencil slide away to some other locality before a tail is attached to the body, and inwardly wonder whether the artist has forgotten to bestow upon her that graceful adjunct, or is intentionally giving us a new species of cattle. We heave a sigh of relief when the pencil returns, after a brief skirmish along the ribs, to bestow upon the cow that terminal appendage, at once a scourge for milk-maids and a swing for dogs. ”

“ The sun may pour down its genial rays and the planks which his way lies over be warm and inviting, but he cannot loiter to enjoy its warmth or survey the beauties of nature. Oh! who would be a mouse? sigh I, as I sit and ponder over his life of inherent fear and uncertainty. ”

“ That carpet the vale of the San Joaquin;” and as they close in upon the devoted inhabitants, their blended cries swell in pitch and compass until the sound resembles the impassioned tone of a fish-peddler’s horn. I stopped at a hotel in the lower part of the city, and before retiring for the night looked carefully about the room. As few mosquitoes were in sight, I concluded to sleep without using the bar. Congratulating myself on being assigned a room where so few of the common enemy of man were lying in wait, I extinguished the light and turned in. ”

“ But, sir, it is with no ordinary thrill of pride that I espouse the cause of the woman who seeks a divorce from a snoring husband. I say, and I may remark that I say it boldly, that I rejoice it was reserved for me to raise my voice in her defence. I hold that a man who with malice aforethought takes from her peaceful home a tender and confiding maiden without first informing her of his trouble, commits a grave and unpardonable crime. ”

“ Thrice has he glided up the slippery incline until the tip of his long tail disappeared from view, but as often has he beat a hasty retreat, assisted on his downward way by a rushing torrent of hot dish-water. ”

“ I actually feel ashamed when I think of the many projects I have abandoned through life, because I met with slight reverses. Here before me is this poor water-soaked rat, his hair still smoking from his recent scald, emerging once more from behind the wood box, determined to solve the problem of the sink-spout or perish in the attempt. A grim smile of resolution seems to part his pointed features, as he moves quietly up to the dripping conduit from which he lately scampered with steaming ribs. ”

“ Let us hope he is some physician who has been attending to his patients; or a minister of the gospel who has spent the night by the bedside of some sinking penitent; or a supervisor, who—while his constituents have been snugly dreaming away their troubles—has been legislating, and growing hoarse declaiming for the public good. Doctor or supervisor, as the case may be, it is evident he is sleepy, and cares not who knows it. Otherwise he would pick up his hat, which has fallen off, before it has twice been stepped on by passengers staggering through the car while it is in motion. ”

“ The absurdity of an irascible wife seeking a divorce from a husband because he indulges too freely in the flowing bowl must be apparent to all. She rushes into the crowded court room, and, figuratively speaking, catches the 165astonished justice by the ear, as Joab in the extremity of his distress laid hold upon the horns of the altar, and requests him to sever the chafing bonds with his legal shears. Again: what a pitiable lack of discretion that woman exhibits who appeals to the court merely because her husband deserts her, leaving her to pursue the even tenor of her way. ”

“ He loses caste among his companions and confidence in himself. He wabbles about here and there to no purpose, like an old bachelor. You deprive him at once of his song and his supper. You can hardly picture to yourself a more dejected insect, one more hopelessly down in the mouth. He withdraws to the ceiling, or curtain, and looks with envious eyes upon his associates gorging themselves while his poor digestive organs are drying through inactivity. ”

“ The wife should not only have a divorce from the deceptive monster, but she should have the custody of the children. She deserves them by virtue of her long suffering and patience, while he who has so heartlessly deceived her cannot be competent to guide their little feet aright in the dangerous walks of life. ”

“ The man had scarcely got the words out of his mouth before “mine host” produced a syringe, large as the trunk of a small-sized elephant, and slapping the nozzle of it into the soup, ran it circling around the plate, and with one long, slobbering draught, like that of a horse drinking through his bits, the soup plate was left lying before the hungry man, as empty as his own stomach. ”

“ If she could have gone into the yard, where I noticed a scholar of the senior class throwing herself in a delirium of joy, brought about by a skipping-rope, she would probably have acquitted herself in a creditable manner, and won the praise of all, for however inferior a person may be to another in some matters, when they can choose their game they often reverse the order, and peradventure the poor stammering scholar could have skipped the skirts off those jogging ahead of her in the common speller. ”

“ A good joke is often lost upon them, and the perpetrator of a bad one places himself in jeopardy. A person who attempts a pun that does not carry its point before it, like a sword-fish, is in danger of being immediately seized from behind and hurried in the direction of the Insane Asylum.
While stopping in this delightful place I visited the small theatre of which the inhabitants are justly proud, and shall never forgive myself if I fail to mention the orchestra, that discoursed most eloquent music on that occasion. ”

“ If there is any one thing I dislike more than another it is a pussy corpse. It is bad enough to have a fat person about you while living, but when they come to peter out it’s worse,—you can’t chuck them under the ground too quick. I had the old emblem of mortality packed away in an ice chest for three weeks, waiting for his wife to come down from the Mountains to attend the funeral, but she finally sent down word that she had got married again, and if she knew the duties of a wife—and she thought she did—her place was alongside of a living husband rather than traipsing after a dead one. ”

“ He is a determined fellow, however, and sticks to an enterprise with the spirit and pertinacity of a world-seeking Columbus, or a prison-breaking Monte Christo. No doubt the hungry edge of appetite is whetted by the strong effluvium arising from Limburger cheese (the people are Germans) that fills the whole atmosphere with an odor truly agreeable to the rodent nose, every time the pantry door is opened. ”

“ He stood most of the time in the centre of the coop in a brown study. Once, while I was looking at him, he attempted to expand the dilapidated substitute for a tail and assume the dignity and strut of other days. The effort was too much for him, and he settled down again into a dreamy, somnolent state, from which the crowing of a large Brahma even failed to arouse him. The poor fellow will doubtless fall a victim to man’s rapacity on New Year, for I noticed a fleshy old epicure regarding him with hungry sinister looks ”

“ We sometimes think the trials and disappointments of humanity are great, but dear me! what are they compared to the miseries of these poor creatures. From their hardships deliver me! For all their care and caution, they do so often miscalculate. This is evidenced by the number of times our old cat enters the house with her mouth full, and her eyes sparkling with pride. ”

“ I have been such a diligent scholar in the severe school of experience, that I have learned to look upon my own misfortunes lightly, and certainly can behold—with an unmoistened eye—my neighbor’s choicest sticks noiselessly slipping into an adjoining yard. ”

“ I believe there is not a race of men on the face of the earth—from Behring Straits to Terra del Fuego, round and about, over and under, or down either quarter—that can extract the same genuine soul-satisfying bliss from a flattened nose or swelled lip, that a real, irrepressible, County Kerry Irishman can. ”

“ Lo, they sit down as jurors, they judge and they vote,
And in steering through life ply an oar in the boat.
The mother departed looks down here with pride
On her merciful child dealing charity wide;
While man, that once governed so harsh and severe,
Applies for positions in meekness and fear;
Now the cane of the dude is no more on the street,
The eyeglass is missing, and sharp-pointed feet,
The poor “chappy” himself is beyond the bright spheres,
For ’tis not the same in a thousand years. ”

“ One white foot, perhaps, a spot too many on the 422head, or want of one above the tail may have cursed him through the length and breadth of his existence. If he lives it must be by his wits. Every man’s hand or boot seems to be against him. The licensed dog can stretch lazily upon the sidewalk and oblige the pedestrians to go around him rather than take the chances of stepping over, or stirring him up with a kick. ”

“ As the skinny white arm stretches up out of the gloom of the washerwoman’s yard, and another billet shoots from the pile and disappears like a star from the firmament of heaven, I feel that a load is lifted from my heart, and I am reaping revenge. ”

“ A soft rabbit under the wide paw of a California lion, or a sparrow in the talons of a hawk, is not more utterly helpless than was the poor dominie in her terrible clutch. His position was anything but an enviable one. ”

“ He’ll shed the tear of woe;
Perhaps he’ll turn him from the sods
That hide a mother’s face,
A father’s smile, a brother’s hand,
Or sister’s buried grace;
But there can hardly come a time
When life will look so drear,
Or can so little reason show
Why he should linger here.
175 A NIGHT OF TERROR. I am not the oldest inhabitant, and don’t know what sort of storms they used to have here before the flood; but I’ll wager a corner lot against a plug of tobacco, that this section, for the last twenty years, has not snoozed through a rougher night than the one just past. ”

“ There is always something amusing to look at as you pass along. There stands the nervous old lady upon the street corner. She wishes to ride, and endeavors to signal the driver and prepare for embarking at one and the same time. She proves the truth of the old saying that a person may get too many irons in the fire. ”

“ There were several Indian camps in the vicinity of the mill, and as wood was rather scarce, the squaws belonging to the camps were in the habit of congregating around this warm drain when the cold weather numbed their poorly protected limbs. It was not an unusual thing to see half a dozen coming down the hill to squat beside the drain, and there sit for hours discussing the current topics of the day, enjoying at the same time the luxury of a cheap steam bath. ”

“ The full blood setter pup fares no better than the worthless poodle that couldn’t smell a quail a yard distant unless it was roasting. The big, sour, surly mastiff, with blood-shot eyes and pendent jowl, who long has been the acknowledged champion of a block, and in his day lacerated many a paw, hasn’t even a growl to offer, but crouches side by side with the poor maimed and mongrel cur that for years has been racking through life on three legs. ”

“ Whew! there it is again, never knew it to fail, follows as naturally as the fruit does the blossom; broad across the shoulders, sure sign of consumption; show me a person broader at the shoulders than at the hips and I will show you an individual that is not long for this world; never knew a person of that build that didn’t die of consumption ”

“ GOING UP THE SPOUT. Rats and mice, like ourselves, often labor at a great disadvantage while endeavoring to make a livelihood. They often make a miss of it altogether by not knowing the proper time to set out upon an expedition. Their life is a perpetual skirmish. They have to take chances and be upon their guard continually. Their mortal enemy and dread, the cat, may be asleep in the fourth story, and the poor mouse knows not of it as he looks wistfully across the intervening 300space between the ash barrel and the basement stairs ”