Page:Everybody's Book of English wit and humour (1880).djvu/50

 present—a gentleman to whom we are all much indebted—to whom we are likely long to owe much—and whom, indeed, we can never hope to repay!" The toast was drunk amidst rapturous applause, in which the good-humoured prince most cordially joined.

"Did you, or did you not speak of me, sir, the other night?" said a peremptory gentleman to a fellow collegian, afterwards an eminent statesman.

"I did or did not speak of you," was the prompt answer.

Mr Pitt, speaking in the House of Commons, in the early part of his career, of the glorious war which preceded the disastrous one, in which we lost the colonies, called it "the last war." Several members cried out: "The last but one;" He took no notice; and, soon after, repeating the mistake, was interrupted by a general cry of "The last war but one! The last war but one!" "I mean, sir," said Pitt, turning to the Speaker, and raising his sonorous voice, "I mean, sir, the last war that Britons would wish to remember." The cry of interruption was instantly changed into universal cheering long and loud.

The late Bishop of Chichester states that at the annual examination of the Charity Schools around the city of Chichester, he was seated in the front row of the school-room, together with his daughters, and the family of the noble house of Richmond, when the Bishop kindly took part in the examination, and put several questions. To one boy he said, "We have all sinned, and come short of the glory of God. Now, does that passage mean that every one of us has sinned?"

The boy hesitated—but, upon a repetition of the question, replied, "Every one except your Lordship, and the company sitting on the front form."

The same Bishop, at one of his confirmations, saw a school-girl inclined to be inattentive and troublesome; he therefore held up his finger as a warning. These children being accustomed to signs from their teachers, of which they were expected to declare the