Page:Everybody's Book of English wit and humour (1880).djvu/83

 going to be confirmed. "Stop," said he, "do you know how many commandments there be?"

"Yes, to be sure," replied the other, "ten."

"Pshaw! you fool!" said the other, "I told the bishop forty, and that would not do; go home, and learn better."

In a private conversation, the late Earl of Chatham asked Dr. Henniker, among other questions, how he defined wit? The doctor replied, "My lord, wit is like what a pension would be given by your lordship to your humble servant—a good thing well applied."

"I can't go to gaol," said a funny vagrant. "I have no time."

"The court provides that," said the magistrate. "I give you ten days."

The children at a Sunday-school, not long since, being asked, among other questions, what bearing false witness against one's neighbour meant, a pert little girl replied: "It is when nobody hain't done nothing, and somebody goes and tells."

An orator lately said to his audience, "I am speaking for the benefit of posterity," when some one shouted, "Yes; and if you don't get done soon they'll be here!"

There was only one passenger on board a certain sailing-vessel, who took his meals in the after-cabin with the captain and mate, and who always suspected that those two worthies defrauded him of his due share of the eatables when they got the chance. One day a roly-poly pudding appeared at dinner, just enough for three, and the passenger, who had a sweet tooth, was instantly on the alert to see that he got his fair and proper third.

"Mr X., do you like pudding-ends, sir?" the captain asked, with the knife poised in air ready to cut the delicacy.

"No, I do not like ends, sir," replied the passenger, who considered that he had as much right to the middle slice as anyone else.