In a lesson in parsing the sentence, "man, courting capacity of bliss, etc.," the word courting comes to a pert young miss of fourteen to parse. She commenced hesitatingly, but got along well enough until she was to tell what it agreed with. Here she stopped short. But as the teacher said, "Very well, what does courting agree with?" Ellen blushed, and hung down her head. "Ellen, don't you know what that agrees with?" "Ye—ye—yes, sir!" "Well, Ellen, why don't you parse that word? What does it agree with?" Blushing still more, and stammering, Ellen says, "It a-agrees with all the girls, sir!"
WHEN THE BOAT STARTED.—406.
A certain green customer, who was a stranger to mirrors, and who stepped into the cabin of one of our ocean steamers, stopping in front of a large pier glass, which he took for a door, said—"I say, mister, when does this here boat start?" Getting no reply from the dumb reflection before him, he again repeated—"I say, mister, when does this here boat start?" Incensed at the still silent figure, he broke out—"You sassafras-coloured, shock-headed bull calf, you don't look as if you knew much anyhow."
THE BLIND PHRENOLOGIST OF ST. LOUIS.—407.
There is a blind phrenologist in St. Louis who is great on examining bumps. A wag or two got one of the distinguished judges, who thinks a great deal of himself, and has a very bald head, which he generally covers with a wig, to go to his rooms one day, and have his head examined. Wags and judge arrive. "Mr. B.," said one, "we have now brought you for examination a head as is a head; we wish to test your science." "Very well," said the phrenologist, "place the head under my hand." "He wears a wig," said one. "Can't examine with that on," replied the professor. Wig was accordingly taken off, and the bald head of the highly-expectant judge was placed under manipulation of the examiner. "What's this? what this?" said the phrenologist; and pressing his hand on the top of the head, he said, somewhat ruffled, "Gentlemen, Heaven has visited me with affliction—I have lost my eyesight—but I am no fool; you can't pass this off on me for a head!"
CHASING A LOCOMOTIVE.—408.
A friend who lately indulged in a chase after a locomotive declares it "the silliest thing a sane man can do." This is his account:—"Rushing out from the refreshment-room on the platform, I saw my train moving off 'gradually,' with about seventy-five yards the start. I have been counted a good runner in my time, and for the first hundred yards I gained on it. Then for about a quarter of a mile it was 'nip and tuck,' at the end of which I concluded that steam was more than a match for muscle, and 'caved.' The last I saw of my train it was 'going it' around a curve at the rate of twenty-five miles an hour, the passengers waving their handkerchiefs at me, and cheering vociferously. As I walked sheepishly back to the dépôt, a thought came into my head that it might run off the track in going round the curve at that rate of speed, and I am afraid that I rather encouraged the idea."
THE LATEST WAY.—409.
The latest way to pop the question is to ask a fair lady if you can have the pleasure of seeing her to the minister's.