An American, fresh from the magnificent woods and rough clearings, was one day visiting the owner of a beautiful seat in Brooklyn; and, walking with him through a little grove, out of which all the underbrush had been cleared, paths had been nicely cut and gravelled, and the rocks covered with woodbine, suddenly stopped, and, admiring the beauty of the scene, lifted up his hands and exclaimed: "This I like! This is Nature—with her hair combed."
NEARING IT BY DEGREES.—659.
"Mrs. Green," said a tolerably dressed female, entering a grocery store, in which were several customers, "have you any fresh-corned pork?" "Yes, ma'am." "How much is this sugar a pound?" "One shilling, ma'am." "Let me have," she continued, lowering her voice, "half a pint of gin, and charge it as sugar on the book."
AN APT PUPIL.—660.
A farmer once hired a Vermonter to assist him in drawing logs. The Yankee, when there was a log to lift, generally contrived to secure the smallest end, for which the farmer chastised him, and told him always to take the butt end. Dinner came and with it a sugar-loaf Indian pudding. Jonathan sliced off a generous portion of the largest part, giving the farmer the wink, and exclaimed: "Always take the butt end."
POETS.—661.
I never seen a poet that warn't as poor as Job's turkey, or a church mouse; nor a she-poet that her shoes didn't go down to heel, and her stockings looked as if they wanted darnin'; for its all cry and little wool with poets.—Sam Slick.
GIN AND WATER.—662.
"Mister, your sign has fallen down!" cried a temperance man to a grog-shop keeper, before whose door a drunken man was prostrate. We don't know, says a paper, whether this temperance man was the same into whose store a customer reeled, exclaiming, "Mr. ——, do you—keep—a-ny—thing—good to take here?" "Yes, we have excellent cold water; the best thing in the world to take." "Well, I know it," was the reply, "there is no one—thing—that's done so much for—navigation—as that."