"Here lies Fuller's earth!"
MDCXC.—AN INHOSPITABLE IRISHMAN.
Sir Boyle Roach, the droll of the Irish bar, sent an amusingly equivocal invitation to an Irish nobleman of his acquaintance: "I hope, my Lord, if ever you come within a mile of my house, that you'll stay there all night." When he was suffering from an attack of gout, he thus rebuked his shoemaker: "O, you're a precious blockhead to do directly the reverse of what I desired you. I told you to make one of the shoes larger than the other, and instead of that you have made one of them smaller than the other!"
MDCXCI.—GOOD ENOUGH FOR A PIG.
An Irish peasant being asked why he permitted his pig to take up its quarters with his family, made an answer abounding with satirical naïveté: "Why not? Doesn't the place afford every convenience that a pig can require?"
MDCXCII.—FARCICAL.
In Bannister's time, a farce was performed under the title of "Fire and Water."—"I predict its fate," said he. "What fate?" whispered the anxious author at his side. "What fate!" said Bannister; "why, what can fire and water produce but a hiss?"
MDCXCIII.—TOO MUCH AT ONCE.
Lord Chesterfield one day, at an inn where he dined, complained very much that the plates and dishes were very dirty. The waiter, with a degree of pertness, observed, "It is said every one must eat a peck of dirt before he dies."—"That may be true," said Chesterfield, "but no one is obliged to eat it all at one meal, you dirty dog."