DXXXIII.—A TIMELY REPROOF.
A young chaplain had preached a sermon of great length. "Sir," said Lord Mulgrave, bowing to him, "there were some things in your sermon of to-day I never heard before."—"O, my lord!" said the flattered chaplain, "it is a common text, and I could not have hoped to have said anything new on the subject."—"I heard the clock strike twice," said Lord Mulgrave.
DXXXIV.—REPROOF.
"I can't find bread for my family," said a lazy fellow in company. "Nor I," replied an industrious miller; "I am obliged to work for it."
DXXXV.—A SATISFACTORY REASON.
Mr. Alexander, the architect of several fine buildings in the county of Kent, was under cross-examination at Maidstone, by Serjeant (afterwards Baron) Garrow, who wished to detract from the weight of his testimony. "You are a builder, I believe?"—"No, sir: I am not a builder; I am an architect!"—"Ah, well! architect or builder, builder or architect, they are much the same, I suppose?"—"I beg your pardon, sir; I cannot admit that: I consider them to be totally different!"—"O, indeed! perhaps you will state wherein this great difference consists?"—"An architect, sir, prepares the plans, conceives the design, draws out the specifications,—in short, supplies the mind. The builder is merely the bricklayer or the carpenter: the builder, in fact, is the machine,—the architect the power that puts the machine together, and sets it going!"—"O, very well, Mr. Architect, that will do! And now, after your very ingenious distinction without a difference, perhaps you can inform the court who was the architect for the Tower of Babel!"—"There was no architect, sir, and hence the confusion!"
DXXXVI.—THE TANNER; AN EPIGRAM.
A Bermondsey tanner would often engage,
In a long tête-à-tête with his dame,
While trotting to town in the Kennington stage,
About giving their villa a name.
A neighbor, thus hearing the skin-dresser talk,
Stole out, half an hour after dark,
Picked up in the roadway a fragment of chalk,
And wrote on the palings,—"Hide Park!"
DXXXVII.—AN ABSENT MAN.
A conceited young man asked Foote what apology he should make for not being one of a party the day before, to which he had been invited. "O, my dear sir," replied the wit, "say nothing about it, you were not missed."