THE COLONEL ANSWERED.—33.
A certain colonel, a staff officer of one of the northern generals, noted for his talent for repartee and the favourable opinion which he entertained of his own good looks, stopped at the house of a farmer, and discovered there a fine milch cow, and, still better, a pretty girl, attired in a neat calico dress cut low in the neck and short in the sleeves. After several unsuccessful attempts to engage the young lady in conversation, he proposed to her to have the cow milked for his own special benefit. This she indignantly refused. The colonel not wishing to compromise his reputation for gallantry, remarked that if all the young ladies in Virginia were as beautiful as the one he had the pleasure of addressing, he had no desire to conquer the Confederacy. With a toss of her pretty head, and a slight elevation of her nose, she answered thus: "Well, sir, if all the gentlemen in your army are as ugly as you are we ladies have no desire to conquer them." How are you, colonel?
PITHY LETTER.—34.
General Rosecrans a few days ago received the following pertinent letter from an indignant private:—"General,—I have been in the service eighteen months, and have never received a cent. I desire a furlough for fifteen days, in order to return home and remove my family to the poor-house." The general granted the furlough.
THE GRAHAM SYSTEM.—35.
A little prattler, who had been brought up on the Graham system, asked what she should have to eat when she went to Heaven. "The bread of life, my dear," was the reply. "Will there be any butter on it, ma?" was the quick retort.
WARD BEECHER'S PREACHING.—36.
Henry Ward Beecher asked Park Benjamin, the poet and humorist, why he never came over to Brooklyn to hear him preach. Benjamin replied, "Why, Beecher, the fact is, I have conscientious scruples against going to places of public amusement on Sunday."