“Why do you go there? You will be all alone.”
“I want to be alone,” he replied.
“Will no one live there but yourself?”
“No one but a hen—a little bantam hen.”
“What do you mean by that? What do you want of a hen?”
“Well, I’ve always had great fondness and respect for hens, but have been unable to get acquainted with them, but this is my chance.”
Mark Twain was once asked to write a testimonial for a map of the world, and this is what he wrote:
“Before using your wonderful map, my family were afflicted with fits, but since using it they have nothing but freckles.”
There was a time when I wished for Mark’s wonderful map, for I was afflicted by a fit. It was at an entertainment at Long Branch given in aid of the Monmouth Hospital. Many actors and actresses who were stopping at “the Branch” gave their services, among them Neil Burgess, Mr. and Mrs. Oliver Dowd Byron, Mr. and Mrs. Matt Snyder, Mr. and Mrs. Frank Chanfrau, Miss Maggie Mitchell, Miss Theresa Vaughn and others. I was to appear, and when I arrived, I saw Miss Vaughn and Mr. Snyder, who was stage manager, holding an animated discussion. Snyder came over to me and said: