Coffee and Repartee

'ARE YOU RELATED TO GOVERNOR McKINLEY?'
ILLUSTRATED

NEW YORK AND LONDON HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS
PUBLISHED BY HARPER & BROTHERS, NEW YORK.
Copyright, 1893, by Harper & Brothers.

The guests at Mrs. Smithers's high-class boarding-house for gentlemen had assembled as usual for breakfast, and in a few moments Mary, the dainty waitress, entered with the steaming coffee, the mush, and the rolls.
The School-master, who, by-the-way, was suspected by Mrs. Smithers of having intentions, and who for that reason occupied the chair nearest the lady's heart, folded up the morning paper, and placing it under him so that no one else could get it, observed, quite genially for him, It was very wet yesterday.
You carried an umbrella, then? queried the landlady, ignoring the Idiot's shaft at the size of her elegant and airy apartments with an ease born of experience.