MILD.—No, sir, I will not.
LANDLORD.—Why not, Mr. Mild?
MILD.—It don't pay, sir. I can't pray on such victuals as these.
And unless you bind yourself in writing to set a better table than
you have for the last three weeks, NARY ANOTHER PRAYER YOU GET OUT
OF ME!
And that's the way the matter stood at latest advices.
1.51. HUNTING TROUBLE.
Hunting trouble is too fashionable in this world. Contentment and jollity are not cultivated as they should be. There are too many prematurely-wrinkled long and melancholy faces among us. There is too much swearing, sweating and slashing, fuming, foaming and fretting around and about us all.
"A mad world, my masters."
People rush outdoors bareheaded and barefooted, as it were, and dash blindly into all sorts of dark alleys in quest of all sorts of Trouble, when, "Goodness knows," if they will only sit calmly and pleasantly by their firesides, Trouble will knock soon enough at their doors.
Hunting Trouble is bad business. If we ever are induced to descend from our present proud position to become a member of the Legislature, or ever accumulate sufficient muscle, impudence, and taste for bad liquor to go to Congress, we shall introduce "a william" for the suppression of Trouble-hunting. We know Miss Slinkins, who incessantly frets because Miss Slurkins is better harnessed than she is, won't like it; and we presume the Simpkinses, who worry so much because the Perkinses live in a freestone-fronted house whilst theirs is only plain brick, won't like it also. It is doubtful, too, whether our long-haired friends the Reformers (who think the machinery of the world is all out of joint, while we think it only needs a little greasing to run in first-rate style), will approve the measure. It is probable, indeed, that very many societies, of a reformatory (and inflammatory) character, would frown upon the measure. But the measure would be a good one nevertheless.
Never hunt Trouble. However dead a shot one may be, the gun he carries on such expeditions is sure to kick or go off half-cocked. Trouble will come soon enough, and when he does come, receive him as pleasantly as possible. Like the tax-collector, he is a disagreeable chap to have in one's house, but the more amiably you greet him the sooner he will go away.