After asking your name in the State of Arkansas, the natives are in the habit of saying, in a confidential tone, "Well, now, what war yer name before yer moved to these parts?"
THE LETTER S.—440.
A writer says the Americans will always have more cause to remember the S than any other letter in the alphabet, because it is the beginning of secession, and the end of Jeff. Davis.
NONSENSE ABOUT LOVE.—441.
What nonsense people talk about love, don't they? Sleepness nights, broken dreams, beatin' hearts, pale faces, a pinin' away to shaders, fits of absence, loss of appetite, narvous flutterin's, and all that. I haven't got the symptoms, but I'll swear to the disease. Folks take this talk, I guess, from poets; and they are miserable, mooney sort of critters; half mad and whole lazy, who would rather take a day's dream than a day's work any time, and catch rhymes as niggers catch flies, to pass time; hearts and darts; cupid and stupid; purlin' streams and pulin' dreams, and so on. It's all bunkum!—Sam Slick.
WONDERFUL.—442.
An exchange, recording the fall of a person into the river, says:—"It is a wonder he escaped with his life." Prentice says: "Wouldn't it have been a still greater wonder if he had escaped without it?"
HARD UP.—443.
Jersey man (entering a dentist's store): "Air yeou a doctor, sir?"—Dentist: "Yes. Can I do anything for you?"—Jersey man: "Wall, no; I guess not in the way of physic. I've jest called to see if yeou don't want to buy some real, genuine, sound teeth?"—Dentist: "Well, I might want them; have you many?"—Jersey man: "I calkilate I can't say I have more'n a few, myself; but our Sal sez she has got some she'll sell, if I can strike a good bargain."—Dentist, having thought for some time, names a price, and the countryman consents.—Jersey man (taking a seat, and coolly spreading himself out): "Wall, I guess yeou may draw a dozen for the present, and I'll bring Sal to-morrow."—Dentist (looking aghast): "Why, you don't mean to sell your own teeth? They're of no use to me."—Jersey man: "Why, look here, they're no airthly use to Sal and me; for what's the use of teeth when one's nothing to eat?"