OFFICE-SEEKERS
Mayor Mitchel of New York was talking at a dinner about office-seekers.
"A good man had just died," he said, "and with unseemly haste an office-seeker came after his job.
"Yes, sir, tho the dead man hadn't been buried, yet this office-seeker came to me and said, breathlessly:
"'Mr. Mayor, do you see any objection to my being put in poor Tom Smith's place?'
"'Why, no,' said I. 'Why, no, I see no objection, if the undertaker doesn't.'"
No matter how hard a man runs for office he is perfectly satisfied to win in a walk.
There is seldom a collision between the office seeking the man and the man seeking the office.
"There goes a fellow who chased around for years trying to land a political job."
"Well, what does he do now?"
"Nothing—he's got the job."
Uncle Mose aspired to the elective office of justice of the peace in the "black bottom" part of town. One bar there was to his preferment: he could neither read nor write. His master advised him to go to the commissioner of elections and ask whether he was eligible. Mose went and returned.
"What did he tell you, Mose?" inquired the master.
"It's all right, sah," answered Mose; "dat gen'lemun suttinly was kind, yas, suh. He tole me Ah was illegible fo' dat office."