RASTUS—"Oh, a mule, and a few chickens, and a hog or two."
At a dinner given by the prime minister of a little kingdom on the Balkan Peninsula, a distinguished diplomat complained to his host that the minister of justice, who had been sitting on his left, had stolen his watch.
"Ah, he shouldn't have done that," said the prime minister, in tones of annoyance. "I will get it back for you."
Sure enough, toward the end of the evening the watch was returned to its owner.
"And what did he say?" asked the diplomat.
"Sh-h," cautioned the host, glancing anxiously about him. "He doesn't know that I have got it back."
Senator "Bob" Taylor, of Tennessee, tells a story of how, when he was "Fiddling Bob," governor of that state, an old negress came to him and said:
"Massa Gov'na, we's mighty po' this winter, and Ah wish you would pardon mah old man. He is a fiddler same as you is, and he's in the pen'tentry."