1. What inheritance he received from his father?
“Not so much as he expected.”
2. What was his lady’s fortune?
“Less than was reported.”
3. What was the value of his living of Ross?
“More than he made of it.”
A PATRIOTIC TOAST.
Most readers will remember the story of a non-committal editor who, during the Presidential canvass of 1872, desiring to propitiate subscribers of both parties, hoisted the ticket of “Gr—— and ——n” at the top of his column, thus giving those who took the paper their choice of interpretations between “Grant and Wilson” and “Greeley and Brown.” A story turning on the same style of point—and probably quite as apocryphal—though the author labels it “historique”—is told of an army officers’ mess in France. A brother-soldier from a neighboring detachment having come in, and a champenoise having been uncorked in his honor, “Gentlemen,” said the guest, raising his glass, “I am about to propose a toast at once patriotic and political.” A chorus of hasty ejaculations and of murmurs at once greeted him. “Yes, gentlemen,” coolly proceeded the orator, “I drink to a thing which—an object that—Bah! I will out with it at once. It begins with an R and ends with an e.”
“Capital!” whispers a young lieutenant of Bordeaux promotion. “He proposes the République, without offending the old fogies by saying the word,”
“Nonsense! He means the Radicale,” replies the other, an old Captain Cassel.