HACKNEY COACHMAN.
A hackney coachman, after putting up his horses in the evening, took out the money he had received during the day, in order to make a division between his master and himself. “There,” says he, “is one shilling for master, and one for me;” and so on alternately till an odd shilling remained. Here he hesitated between conscience and self-interest, when the master, who happened to be a concealed spectator, said, “I think, Thomas, you may allow me the odd shilling, as I keep the horses.”
NO REASON TO REMOVE.
A gentleman dined one day with a dull preacher. Dinner was scarcely over before the gentleman fell asleep, but was awakened by the divine, and invited to go and hear him preach. “I beseech you, sir,” said he, “to excuse me; I can sleep very well where I am.”
EXCLUSIVE PLUMBER.
Holroyd, king’s plumber, stood in the pit of the theatre at the time that Hatfield fired at King George III., and it was reported that by his lifting up the assassin’s arm at the moment he was firing, the pistol was raised so that the ball went higher than the box his majesty was seated in. Some one observed that “This was a very loyal thing in the plumber.” “Why, yes,” replied a gentlemen present, “it looks like it; but the motive might possibly be selfish; it perhaps arose from Holroyd not choosing that anyone should serve the king with lead except himself.”
CHARLES II.
As James II. when Duke of York, returned one morning from hunting, he found his brother Charles in Hyde Park without any attendants, at what was considered a perilous time. The duke expressed his surprise at his majesty’s venturing alone in so public a place at so dangerous a period. “James,” replied the monarch, “take care of yourself, and I am safe. No man in England will kill me to make you king.”
REFORMATION.
A gentleman remarking that this age was infinitely more dissipated and licentious than that which preceded it, an old officer took upon himself the task of defending it. “Sir,” says he, “I grant that we get drunk as completely as our fathers; but this I will say, that I have not seen a wig burnt these forty years.”