“I suppose that, as he is a college man, I’ll have to be awful careful what I say. Whatever will I talk about to him?”
The friend suggested history as a safe topic. To her friend’s astonishment she took the advice seriously, and shortly commenced in earnest to “bone up” in English history.
When the young man called, the girl listened for some time with ill-concealed impatience to his talk of football, outdoor meets, dances, etc., but finally she decided to take the matter in her own hands. She had not done all that reading for nothing; so, a pause in the conversation affording the desired opportunity, she suddenly exclaimed, with considerable vivacity:
“Wasn’t it awful about Mary, Queen of Scots?”
“Why, what’s the matter?” stammered the student, confused.
“My gracious!” almost yelled the girl from Indiana, “didn’t you know? Why, the poor thing had her head cut off!”
A lady was calling on some friends one summer afternoon. The talk buzzed along briskly, fans waved and the daughter of the house kept twitching uncomfortably, frowning and making little smothered exclamations of annoyance. Finally, with a sigh, she rose and left the room.
“Your daughter,” said the visitor, “seems to be suffering from the heat.”
“No,” said the hostess. “She is just back home from college and she is suffering from the family grammar.”
A city man once had occasion, says “Lippincott’s Magazine,” to stop at a country home where a tin basin and a roller-towel on the back porch sufficed for the family’s ablutions. For two mornings the “hired man” of the household watched in silence the visitor’s efforts at making a toilette under the unfavorable auspices, but when on the third day the tooth-brush, nail-file, whisk-broom, etc., had been duly used and returned to their places in the traveler’s grip, he could suppress his curiosity no longer, so boldly put the question: “Say, Mister, air you always that much trouble to yo’se’f?”
A famous statesman prided himself on his success in campaigning, when called upon to reach a man’s vote through his family pride.
On one of his tours he passed through a country town when he came suddenly upon a charming group—a comely woman with a bevy of little ones about her—in a garden. He stopped short, then advanced and leaned over the front gate.