Golden Days for Boys and Girls Part 25

Noses have they, but they smell not--teapots.

Mouths have they, but they taste not--rivers.

Hands have they, but they handle not--Clocks.

Ears have they, but they hear not--cornstalks.

Tongues have they, but they talk not--wagons.

[Ill.u.s.tration:

_Teacher_--"I am sorry, William, to have to whip a big boy like you.

It grieves me terribly."

_William_--"It don't grieve you half as much as it does me."]

CREAM OF THE COMICS.

"Brisk as a bee."

--_Boswell's Life of Johnson_.

--In the drama of life the clerk plays a counter-part.

--Why is a whisper forbidden in polite society? Because it isn't aloud.

[Ill.u.s.tration: AN ILl.u.s.tRATED TALE.]

--A tinsmith in the country has a sign which reads: "Quart measures of all shapes and sizes sold here."

--Customer: "Is your bread nice and light?"

Baker's boy: "Yessum; it only weighs nine ounces to the pound!"

--"Home, Sweet Home"--a bee-hive.

--The egotist lives on an I-land.

--The Bank of England--a fog-bank.

--"April showers bring forth May flowers."

Said Flora to her brother Bob: "Robert, dear, what do April showers bring forth?"

Said Bob: "Umbrellas, of course!"

--"Don't you find the people around here very sociable?" asked Cobwigger of a new neighbor.

"Yes, indeed, I do," was the hearty response. "Only a moment ago I met a beggar, and he held out his hand to me."

--"Pa," said little Jimmie, "I was very near going to the head of my cla.s.s to-day."

"How is that, my son?"

"Why, a big word came all the way down to me, and if I could only have spelled it, I should have gone clear up."

--Mamma (coaxingly): "Come, Bobby, take your medicine now, and then jump into bed!"

Bobby: "I do not want to take my medicine, mamma."

Father (who knows how to govern children) "Robert, if you don't take your medicine at once, you will be put to bed without taking it at all."

--A little girl in Charles Street, Boston, has an old-fas.h.i.+oned doll which has the following words worked in red silk letters on its sawdust-stuffed body:

"Steal not this doll for fear of shame, For here you see the owner's name.

"PRISCILLA ALDEN."

--A little grammar found in an old garret in Portsmouth, N.H., has an ill.u.s.tration representing the difference between the active, pa.s.sive and neuter verbs. It is a picture of a father whipping his boy. The father is active, the boy is pa.s.sive, and the mother, sitting by herself on a stool, looking on, but doing nothing, is neuter.

--"Here, Johnnie, what do you mean by taking Willie's cake away from him? Didn't you have a piece for yourself?"

"Yes; but you told me I always ought to take my little brother's part."

--Young physician (who has just lost a patient, to old physician): "Would you advise an autopsy, doctor?"

Old physician: "No; I would advise an inquest."

--"Pause!" cries the sire unto the lad, "Let judgment teach you sense."

"I will," he answers, "when I've had Enough experience."

--Doctor: "Now, my little man, you take this medicine and I will give you five cents."

Young America: "You take it yourself, and I will go you five cents better."

--Mistaking the door, young Mr. Cipher walked into the dentist's office instead of the doctor's.

"Doctor," he groaned, "I'm in bad shape. My head aches all the time, and I can't do anything with it."

"Yes, yes," said Doctor Toothaker, cheerfully. "I see; big cavity in it; must be hollow; you'll need to have it filled."

And, seeing his mistake, young Mr. Cipher apologized and went out, and told it all around as a capital joke on the dentist.

[Ill.u.s.tration: JOHNNIE'S FIRST FIs.h.i.+NG EXCURSION OF THE SEASON.

What he caught at the pond.

What he caught when he got home!]

OUR LETTER BOX.

DECLINED.--A Sad Catastrophe--A Stage-Driver's Story--My Dog Carlo--The Children's Celebration--Flossie's Letter--The Scotch Yacht Thistle--Brave Dog Nero and his Friends--Our First Boat Ride--Little Sam, a Tale of Long Ago--Penny.

Q. K.--The first fire insurance office in the United States was established at Boston in 1724; the first life insurance at Philadelphia in 1812.