A pleasant young fellow, about half-seas-over, passing through the Strand at a late hour, was accosted by a watchman, who began with all the insolence of office to file a string of interrogatories, in the hope of being handsomly paid for his trouble.
"What is your name, sir?"--"Five Shillings."
"Where do you live?"--"Out of the king's dominions."
"Where have you been?"--"Where you would have been with all your heart."
"Where are you going?"--"Where you dare not go for your ears."
The officious guardian of the night thought these answers sufficient to warrant him to take the young man to the watch-house. The next morning, on being brought before the magistrate, he told his worship, "that as to the first question, his name was Thomas Crown; with regard to the second, he lived in Little Britain; with respect to the third, he had been drinking a glass of wine with a friend; and that as to the last," said he, "I was going home to my wife." The magistrate reprimanded the watchman in severe terms, and wished Mr. Crown a good morning.--I.B.D.
General Anstruther, having made himself unpopular, was obliged, on his return to Scotland, to pass in disguise to his own estate; and crossing a frith, he said to the waterman, "This is a pretty boat, I fancy you sometimes smuggle with it." The fellow replied, "I never smuggled a Brigadier before."
Amadeus the Ninth, Count of Savoy, being once asked where he kept his hounds, he pointed to a great number of poor people, who were seated at tables, eating and drinking, and replied, "Those are my hounds, with whom I go in chase of Heaven." When he was told that his alms would exhaust his revenues, "Take the collar of my order," said he, "sell it, and relieve my people." He was surnamed "the Happy."
_In Stratford Churchyard, near Salisbury._
To the memory of Elizabeth, wife of William Brunsdon, who died Dec. 31, 1779, aged 101 years.
Freed from the sorrows, sickness, pain, and care, To which all breath-inspired clay is heir, The tend'rest mother, and the worthiest wife, Reaps the full harvest of a well-spent life. Here rest her ashes with her kindred dust-- Death's only conquest o'er the favoured just: Her soul in Christ the tyrant's power defied, And the _Saint_ triumphed when the woman died.