"Where is the hoe, Sambo?"—"Wid de rake, massa."—"Well, where is the rake?"—"Wid de hoe."—"But where are they both?"—"Why, bof togeder. By golly, old massa, you 'pears to be berry 'ticular dis mornin'."
A JEW D'ESPRIT.—492.
Mr. Noah, a Jew, was a candidate for the office of sheriff of the city of New York, and it was objected to his election that a Jew would thus come to have the hanging of Christians. "Pretty Christians, indeed," remarked Noah, "to need hanging!"
CUFF'S CABIN.—493.
A gentleman riding through Virginia was overtaken by a violent thunder-storm. He took shelter in a negro's cabin, and found the water streaming through many crevices in the roof. "Why don't you mend your roof, Cuff?" he asked. "Oh, um rain so, maussa, 'can't," said the negro. "But why don't you mend it when it doesn't rain?" asked the gentleman. "Yah, maussa," said the negro, with a grin, "den um dohn want mendin'."
SMALL WAISTS AND TIGHT LACING.—494.
"My dear girls," said the preacher, "I like to see a small waist as well as anybody, and females with hour-glass shapes suit my fancy better than your Dutch-churn, soap-barrel, slab-sided sort of figures; but I don't want to give the credit to corsets."—Dow's Sermons.
THACKERAY AND THE PIRATE'S DAUGHTER.—495.
Shortly after his first landing in America, Thackeray was invited to dinner by one of the Messrs. Harper, the well-known publishing firm, whose magazine, Harper's Monthly, is a deliberate compilation from all the best English periodicals. On his introduction to Mr. Harper, Thackeray had joked with him on the American contempt for copyright; and when he went into the drawing-room he took a little girl, whom he found playing there, on his knee, and gazing at her with feigned wonder, said in solemn tones, "And this is a pirate's daughter!"