"Humph! Dat ain't nothin', chile," said the old quack, with an air of superior wisdom. "Why, I've done cured convalescence in twenty-foah hours!"
THE NEW NATURAL HISTORY
A hard-working fancy dealer had ransacked the whole shop in his efforts to please an old lady who wanted to purchase a present--"anything real nice"--for her granddaughter. For the fifteenth time she picked up and critically examined a neat little satchel.
"Are you quite sure that this is genuine alligator skin?" she inquired.
"Positive, madam," quoth the dealer. "I shot that alligator myself."
"It looks rather soiled," said the lady.
"That, madam, is where it struck the ground when it tumbled off the tree."
DURABILITY WANTED
A New York editor tells a story of a man who was the father of twelve children, all of whom had been rocked to sleep by the same toe and in the same cradle. The toe stood it all right, but the cradle had begun to show signs of wear toward the end of the rocking period of the twelfth.
"John," said the wife one day, looking fondly at the cradle at her side, "this old cradle has done good service, but it is about worn out. I am afraid it is nearly gone!"