"Well," said the gentleman, "I'll tell you what to do: go to John Chamberlin's café; order your beefsteak and onions, and eat them. When you get your bill it will be so big that it will quite take your breath away."
97. THE EXTENT OF SCIENCE
"And now," said the learned lecturer on geology who had addressed a small but deeply attentive audience at the village hall, "I have tried to make these problems, abstruse as they may appear, and involving in their solution the best thoughts, the closest analysis, and the most profound investigations of our noblest scientific men for many years; I have tried, I say, to make them seem comparatively simple and easily understood, in the light of modern knowledge. Before I close this lecture I shall be glad to answer any questions that may occur to you as to points that appear to need clearing up or that may have been overlooked."
There was a silence of a few moments, and then an anxious-looking man in the rear of the hall rose up.
"I would take it as a favor," he said, "if you could tell me whether science has produced as yet any reliable and certain cure for warts."
98. WHAT'S IN A NAME?
One of the managers of a home for destitute colored children tells a funny story about the institution. She went out there to see how things were getting along, and found a youngster as black as the inside of a coal mine tied to a bed-post, with his hands behind him.
"What is that boy tied up there for?" she demanded of the attendant.
"For lying, ma'am. He is the worstist, lyingest nigger I ever seen."
"What's his name?