English Jests and Anecdotes, Collected from Various SourcesVarious
General
English Jests and Anecdotes, Collected from Various Sources
Various
Anecdotes -- England; English wit and humor
_NUGGETS FOR TRAVELLERS_
English Anecdotes
_NUGGETS FOR TRAVELLERS_
_Uniform with this volume, price 1s. each_
Scottish Jests and Anecdotes
Irish Jests and Anecdotes
English
Jests and
Anecdotes
_Collected from_
VARIOUS SOURCES
_WILLIAM PATERSON_
_14 Clyde Street, Edinburgh_
ENGLISH ANECDOTES.
LACHRYMAL CANALS.
A lady who kept a boarding-school some years ago, near London, wrote
a novel, in which, among other extravagant expressions, occurred the
following:--“His Lordship could not weep; the tale of sorrow had frozen
his lachrymal canals.” A person to whom the fair author lent a copy
of her work, returned it, after a perusal, with this note appended in
pencil to the word _canals_: “Madam, I am a keen skater; would they
bear?”
THE DUCHESS OF NEWCASTLE.
This famous lady, who wrote many plays and romances, in the most
extravagant taste of the reign of Charles II., asked Bishop Wilkins,
how she could get up to the world he had discovered in the moon; for,
as the way must needs be long, a person travelling thither would
require to have some resting places by the way? “Oh, madam,” said the
bishop, “your grace, who has built so many castles in the air, can be
at no loss.”
PENNANT’S ANTIPATHY TO WIGS.
Mr. Pennant had an unaccountable antipathy to _wigs_. Dining at Chester
with an officer who wore a wig, when they had drunk pretty freely, he,
after much impatience, and many wistful looks, started up, seized the
wig, and threw it into the fire. It was in flames in a moment, and so
was the officer, who ran to his sword. Down stairs flew Pennant, and
the officer after him, through all the streets of Chester. But Pennant
escaped from superior local knowledge. This a wag called _Pennant’s
Tour in Chester_.
A LINE FOR THE OTHER WORLD.
A felon who was just on the point of being turned off, asked the
hangman if he had any message to send to the place where he was going?
“I will trouble you with _a line_,” replied the finisher of the law,
placing the cord under his left ear.
WIT AND THE OPPOSITE.
Dryden and Otway lived opposite to each other in Queen Street. Otway
coming one night from the tavern, chalked upon Dryden’s door, “Here
lives John Dryden; he is a _wit_.” Dryden knew his handwriting, and,
next day, chalked on Otway’s door, “Here lives Tom Otway; he is
_oppo-site_.”
PURGATORY.
“With regard to purgatory,” says an old popish writer, “with regard
to purgatory, I will not _say_ a great deal; but this much I
_think_,--that the Protestants may go farther, and fare worse.”
GREED IN LETTERS.
It being proved, on a trial at Guildhall, that a man’s name was really
_Inch_, who pretended that it was _Linch_. “I see,” said the judge,
“the old proverb is verified in this man, who being allowed an _Inch_,
has taken an _L_.”
KEEPING ONE’S BED.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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