“Well, there was one thing,” he finally said, “of which I was always very proud. One cold winter’s night on the street I met a little crippled newsboy. He was crying. I stopped and spoke to him. He said he cried because he couldn’t sell his papers; so I bought a paper from him. The price, of it was only a penny, but I gave him three pennies for it.”
“Excuse me for one moment,” said St. Peter. “I must ask my confrère to consult the files and see whether your statement is correct.”
The Angel Gabriel looked through the Doomsday book and, finding there a certain entry, nodded his head. St. Peter and Gabriel consulted together in low tones. It appeared that they could not go behind the returns. At length Gabriel slammed the covers of the great volume together and exclaimed:
“Oh, just give him back his three cents and tell him to go to hell!”
§ 289 Stylish Language, Indeed!
For years, a certain worthy and highly intelligent old colored woman did our family washing. One Saturday night after she had fetched the week’s laundry she sat in the kitchen of our home before she started on her return trip to her own house a mile and a half away. My mother came to the kitchen door to chat with her a little while.
From remarks which the old woman let fall, my mother gathered that Aunt Milly, although very devout, did not seem to care deeply for the present pastor of her church.
“Mis’ Manie,” said Aunt Milly, “I’m goin’ tell you how I put that there biggety preachin’ man in his place. Yere yistiddy evenin’ jest ’fo’ suppertime, I wuz settin’ on my front po’ch w’en the Rev’n Rogers come along by. He sees me settin’ there an’ he stops an’ fumbles wid the gate latch an’ he sez to me he sez, ‘Sist’ Carter, I would have speech with thee?’—jest lak that.
“Now, Mis’ Manie, I ain’t aimin’ to let no nigger whatsoever, even ef he is a min’ster of the gospel, use mo’ stylish language ’en whut I kin. So I sez right back to him, I sez, ‘Rev’n, draw nigh an’ ye shall be heard!’
“So he undo the gate an’ come on up the walk to my do’step. But no sooner do he start in to speak ’en I know whut ’tis he’s fixin’ to say. He fixin’ to ax my sympathy on ’count of that tore-down limb of a onmarried daughter of his’n havin’ got herse’f mixed up in a scandalizin’ an’ bein’ tawked about all over the neighborhood. So, jest soon ez I sees whut he’s drivin’ at, I th’ows up my right hand like this, an’ I sez to him, I sez,