The Jest Book<br />The Choicest Anecdotes and Sayings by Mark Lemon (best free ereader TXT) 📖
- Author: Mark Lemon
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Lord Byron, in reference to a lady he thought ill of, writes, "Lady —— has been dangerously ill; but it may console you to learn that she is dangerously well again."
CDXV.—EPIGRAM.(On Lord E—nb——h's pericranium.)
Deceive themselves by thinking for a minute,
That dandy E—nb——h's "knowledge-box"
Has anything worth larceny within it.
CDXVI.—A NEW SCHOLAR.
A Californian gold digger having become rich, desired a friend to procure for him a library of books. The[Pg 90] friend obeyed, and received a letter of thanks thus worded: "I am obliged to you for the pains of your selection. I particularly admire a grand religious poem about Paradise, by a Mr. Milton, and a set of plays (quite delightful) by a Mr. Shakespeare. If these gentlemen should write and publish anything more, be sure and send me their new works."
CDXVII.—PUTTING A STOP TO PILGRIM'S PROGRESS.Jemmy Gordon, meeting the prosecutor of a felon, named Pilgrim, who was convicted and sentenced to be transported at the Cambridge assizes, exclaimed, "You have done, sir, what the Pope of Rome could never do; you have put a stop to Pilgrim's Progress!"
CDXVIII.—EPIGRAM.That fortune plays full many a prank;
And when poor —— got his mind,
'Twas fortune made him draw a blank.
CDXIX.—A SUDDEN CHANGE.
One drinking some beer at a petty ale-house in the country, which was very strong of the hops and hardly any taste of the malt, was asked by the landlord, if it was not well hopped. "Yes," answered he, "if it had hopped a little farther, it would have hopped into the water."
CDXX.—VALUABLE DISCOVERY.A recent philosopher discovered a method to avoid being dunned! "How—how—how?" we hear everybody asking. He never run in debt.
CDXXI.—A USEFUL ALLY."Cracked China mended!" Zounds, man, off this minute! There's work for you, or else the deuce is in it!
CDXXII.—TWO SIDES TO A SPEECH.Charles Lamb sitting next some chattering woman at[Pg 91] dinner, observing he didn't attend to her, "You don't seem," said the lady, "to be at all the better for what I am saying to you!"—"No, ma'am," he answered, "but this gentleman on the other side of me must, for it all came in at one ear and went out at the other!"
CDXXIII.—WILKIE'S SIMPLICITY.On the birth of a friend's son (now a well-known novelist), Sir David Wilkie was requested to become one of the sponsors for his child. Sir David, whose studies of human nature extended to everything but infant human nature, had evidently been refreshing his boyish recollections of puppies and kittens; for, after looking intently into the child's eyes, as it was held up for his inspection, he exclaimed to the father, with serious astonishment and satisfaction, "He sees!"
CDXXIV.—RINGING THE CHANGES.Messrs. More, Strange, and Wright
Met to drink, and good thoughts to exchange:
Says More, "Of us three,
The whole town will agree,
There is only one knave, and that's Strange."
"Yes," says Strange (rather sore),
"I'm sure there's one More,
A most terrible knave and a bite,
Who cheated his mother,
His sister and brother."—
"O yes," replied More, "that is Wright."
CDXXV.—KNOWING HIS MAN.
A man was brought before Lord Mansfield, charged with stealing a silver ladle, and the counsel for the crown was rather severe upon the prisoner for being an attorney. "Come, come," said his lordship, "don't exaggerate matters; if the fellow had been an attorney, he would have stolen the bowl as well as the ladle."[Pg 92]
CDXXVI.—A SMALL GLASS.The manager of a Scotch theatre, at which F.G. Cooke was playing Macbeth, seeing him greatly exhausted towards the close of the performance, offered him some whiskey in a very small thistle-glass, saying at the same time, by way of encouragement, "Take that, Mr. Cooke; take that, sir; it is the real mountain dew; that will never hurt you, sir!"—"Not if it was vitriol!" was the rejoinder.
CDXXVII.—DOMESTIC ECONOMY.The following bill of fare (which consists of a dish of fish, a joint of meat, a couple of fowls, vegetables, and a pudding, being in all seven dishes for sevenpence!) had its rise in an invitation which a young lady of forty-seven sent to her lover to dine with her on Christmas Day. To unite taste and economy is no easy thing; but to show her lover she had learned that difficult art, she gave him the following dinner:—
—Seven dishes for sevenpence!
CDXXVIII.—AN EMPTY HEAD.Of a light, frivolous, flighty girl, whom Jerrold met frequently, he said, "That girl has no more head than a periwinkle."
CDXXIX.—A BAD LABEL.Tom bought a gallon of gin to take home; and, by way[Pg 93] of a label, wrote his name upon a card, which happened to be the seven of clubs, and tied it to the handle. A friend coming along, and observing the jug, quietly remarked: "That's an awful careless way to leave that liquor!"—"Why?" said Tom. "Because somebody might come along with the eight of clubs and take it!"
CDXXX.—"AYE! THERE'S THE RUB."A gentleman, playing at piquet, was much teased by a looker-on who was short-sighted, and, having a very long nose, greatly incommoded the player. To get rid of the annoyance, the player took out his handkerchief, and applied it to the nose of his officious neighbor. "Ah! sir," said he, "I beg your pardon, but I really took it for my own."
CDXXXI.—MORAL EQUALITY OF MAN.All honest men, whether counts or cobblers, are of the same rank, if classed by moral distinctions.
CDXXXII.—A SILK GOWN.Grattan said of Hussey Burgh, who had been a great Liberal, but, on getting his silk gown, became a Ministerialist, that all men knew silk to be a non-conducting body, and that since the honorable member had been enveloped in silk, no spark of patriotism had reached his heart.
CDXXXIII.—EPIGRAM BY A PLUCKED MAN.Every Cantab, it is presumed, knows where Shelford Fen is, and that it is famous for rearing geese. A luckless wight, who had the misfortune to be plucked at his examination for the degree of B.A., when the Rev. T. Shelford was his examiner, made the following extemporaneous epigram:—
But never till now knew that Shelford plucked men."
CDXXXIV.—THE MEASURE OF A BRAIN.
One afternoon, when Jerrold was in his garden at Putney,[Pg 94] enjoying a glass of claret, a friend called upon him. The conversation ran on a certain dull fellow, whose wealth made him prominent at that time.
"Yes," said Jerrold, drawing his finger round the edge of his wineglass, "that's the range of his intellect, only it had never anything half so good in it."
CDXXXV.—FOOTE AND LORD TOWNSEND.Foote, dining one day with Lord Townsend, after his duel with Lord Bellamont, the wine being bad, and the dinner ill-dressed, made Foote observe, that he could not discover what reason could compel his lordship to fight, when he might have effected his purpose with much more ease to himself. "How?" asked his lordship. "How?" replied the wit, "why you should have given him a dinner like this, and poisoned him."
CDXXXVI.—UNREASONABLE."Tom," said a colonel to one of his men, "how can so good and brave a soldier as you get drunk so often?"—"Colonel," replied he, "how can you expect all the virtues that adorn the human character for sixpence a-day?"
CDXXXVII.—AN HONEST WARRANTY.A gentleman once bought a horse of a country-dealer. The bargain concluded, and the money paid, the gentleman said, "Now, my friend, I have bought your horse, what are his faults?"—"I know of no faults that he has, except two," replied the man; "and one is, that he is hard to catch."—"Oh! never mind that," said the buyer, "I will contrive to catch him at any time, I will engage; but what is the other?"—"Ah, sir! that is the worst," answered the fellow; "he is good for nothing when you have caught him."
CDXXXVIII.—THE REASON WHY.A man said the only reason why his dwelling was not blown away in a late storm was, because there was a heavy mortgage on it.[Pg 95]
CDXXXIX.—BLOTTING IT OUT.Mathews's attendant, in his last illness, intending to give him his medicine, gave in mistake some ink from a phial on a shelf. On discovering the error, his friend exclaimed, "Good heavens! Mathews, I have given you ink."—"Never—never mind, my boy—never mind," said Mathews, faintly, "I'll swallow a bit—of blotting-paper."
CDXL.—CLERICAL WIT.An old gentleman of eighty-four having taken to the altar a young damsel of about sixteen, the clergyman said to him, "The font is at the other end of the church."—"What do I want with the font?" said the old gentleman. "Oh! I beg your pardon," said the clerical wit, "I thought you had brought this child to be christened."
CDXLI.—A NICE DISTINCTION.Ned Shuter thus explained his reasons for preferring to wear stockings with holes to having them darned:—"A hole," said he, "may be the accident of a day, and will pass upon the best gentleman, but a darn is premeditated poverty."
CDXLII.—WIT AND QUACKERY.A celebrated quack, while holding forth on a stage of Chelmsford, in order to promote the sale of his medicine, told the people that he came there for their good, and not for want. And then addressing his Merry Andrew, "Andrew," said he, "do we come here for want?"—"No faith, sir," replied Andrew, "we have enough of that at home."
CDXLIII.—WIT DEFINED.Dryden's description of wit is excellent. He says:—
Comely in thousand shapes appears;
'Tis not a tale, 'tis not a jest,
Admired with laughter at a feast;
Nor florid talk, which can this title gain,—
The proofs of wit for ever must remain."
[Pg 96] CDXLIV.—A VAIN SEARCH.
Sir Francis Blake Delaval's death had such an effect on Foote that he burst into tears, retired to his room, and saw no company for two days; the third day, Jewel, his treasurer, calling in upon him, he asked him, with swollen eyes, what time would the burial be? "Not till next week, sir," replied the other, "as I hear the surgeons are first to dissect his head." This last word restored Foote's fancy, and, repeating it with some surprise, he asked, "And what will they get there? I am sure I have known poor Frank these five-and-twenty years, and I never could find anything in it."
CDXLV.—A BAD CUSTOMER."We don't sell spirits," said a law-evading beer-seller; "we will give you a glass; and then, if you want a biscuit, we'll sell it to you for three ha'pence." The "good creature" was handed down, a stiff glass swallowed, and the landlord handed his customer a biscuit. "Well, no, I think not," said the customer; "you sell 'em too dear. I can get lots of 'em five or six for a penny anywhere else."
CDXLVI.—A REFLECTION.An overbearing barrister, endeavoring to brow-beat a witness, told him he could plainly see a rogue in his face. "I never knew till now," said the witness, "that my face was a looking-glass."
CDXLVII.—FOOTE.An artist named Forfeit, having some job to do for Foote, got into a foolish scrape about the antiquity of family with another artist, who gave him such a drubbing as confined him to his bed for a considerable time. "Forfeit! Forfeit!" said Foote, "why, surely you have the best of the argument; your family is not only several thousand years old, but at the same time the most numerous of any on the face of the globe, on the authority of Shakespeare:—
[Pg 97] CDXLVIII.—INQUEST EXTRAORDINARY.
Verdict,—had tried to wash a shirt marked Wetherall.[A]
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