PAY YOUR POSTAGE.—42.
An American paper commends the following terrible lines to some of its correspondents who have forgotten to prepay their letters, and saddled the editor with sundry twopences to save their penny. The wild beauty of the lines bespeaks the editor to have been in a mesmeric coma:—
"The man who now-a-days will write,
And not prepay his letter,
Is worser than the heathen are,
What don't know any better.
"And if you take a fine tooth-comb,
And rake down all creation,
You couldn't find a meaner man
In this 'ere mighty nation."
SOUND ADVICE.—43.
The private secretary of a cabinet minister is a wag. The other day a young man, decidedly inebriated, walked into the executive chamber and asked for the governor. "What do you want with him?" inquired the secretary. "Oh, I want an office with a good salary—a sinecure." "Well," replied the secretary, "I can tell you something better for you than a sinecure—you had better try a water cure." A new idea seemed to strike the young inebriate, and he vanished.
SIMPLICITY.—44.
An exchange tells the following simple story of a little child kneeling by his bed to pray, as he retired for the night. He said: "Dear Heavenly Father, please don't let the large cow hook me, nor the horse kick me; and don't let me run away outside of the gate when mother tells me not to."
CORKING UP DAYLIGHT.—45.
It is reported that a Yankee down East has invented a machine for corking up daylight, which will eventually supersede gas. He covers the interior of a flour barrel with shoemaker's wax, holds it open to the sun, then suddenly heads up the barrel. The light sticks to the wax, and at night can be cut into lots to suit purchasers.