English Jests and Anecdotes, Collected from Various SourcesVarious
General
English Jests and Anecdotes, Collected from Various Sources
Various
Anecdotes -- England; English wit and humor
A certain clergyman, who was more busied in the pleasures of the chase
than in superintending the souls of his flock, one day, meeting with
little sport, proposed to entertain his companions at the expense of an
inoffensive quaker, whom he had very often ridiculed, and who was then
approaching them. He rode up to him briskly, saying, “Obadiah, have you
seen the hare?” “Why, hast thou lost him, neighbour?” said the quaker.
“Lost him! yes, indeed.” “Then,” replied he, “if I were the hare I
would run where I am sure thou could’st never find me.” “Where the
devil is that?” asked the blustering son of Nimrod. “Why, neighbour,”
answered the other, “I would run into thy study!”
AMENDMENT.
An Earl Marshal was found fault with by his sovereign for some
misarrangements at a coronation. “Please your Majesty,” said he, “I
hope to do better next time.”
LORD CHESTERFIELD.
Lord Chesterfield chanced one day to be at the Duke of Newcastle’s
levee, when _Garnet upon Job_, a book dedicated to that nobleman,
happened to lie in the window. Before his Grace made his appearance,
his Lordship had time enough to amuse himself with the book; and when
the Duke entered, he found him reading in it. “Well, my Lord,” said
his Grace, “what is your opinion of that book?” “In any other place I
should not think much of it,” replied his Lordship; “but being in your
Grace’s levee, I think it one of the best books in the world.”
A lady of fashion, very young, very giddy, and just married, walking
with Lord Chesterfield, asked his Lordship if she did not look very
young? “Indeed, my lady,” said he, “you look as if you were just come
from boarding-school, and fit to return again.”
As Lord L---- was one day lamenting to his Lordship the misconduct
of his son, the latter advised a place at court as one method which,
perhaps, might cause an amendment. The father replied he was not steady
enough. “Yes, yes,” said his Lordship, “he is steady enough to be
Master of the Revels.”
EFFECT OF POETRY.
James I. first coined his twenty-two shilling pieces, called Jacobuses,
with his head crowned. He afterwards coined his twenty shilling pieces,
where he wore the laurel instead of the crown. Ben Jonson observed on
this that “Poets always came to poverty; King James no sooner began to
wear bays, than he fell two shillings in the pound.”
GEORGE III.
Mr. West, the painter, told his Majesty one day that he had been
employed by one of his principal ministers for what is called in the
language of the profession a _head_. He had waited on him that morning,
and had found him so dejected and with so long a face, on account of
some bad news, that he could not begin. “Sir,” says his Majesty, “if
that noble lord’s head cannot keep up countenance, it is time to employ
another hand than yours to take it off.”
A SEASONABLE HINT.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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