Josh Billings on Ice, and Other ThingsBillings, Josh
General
Josh Billings on Ice, and Other Things
Billings, Josh
American wit and humor
I also saw another one pretty soon, which belonged tew a mature matron.
She might hav saw 75 summers; her hair waz white az flour (Perkins "A,"
worth 15 dollars a barrell, delivered); but the waterfall was black.
I asked a bystander how he could account for that.
He said "it waz younger."
I also saw another one pretty soon, which waz the property ov a gusher.
She was about 19 years old, and waz az ripe az a 2 year peach.
She swept the streets like a thing of life.
Men stopped to gaze az she pazsed, and put in a new chew ov tobacco.
Little boys pocketed their marbles in silence.
Her waterfall waz about the size ov a corn-basket turned inside out.
It waz inklozed in a common skap net, and kivered with blazing dimonds
ov glass.
It shone in the frisky sun like the tin dome on the Court House, whare
the supervizors meet.
But i rather like waterfalls.
It haz bin sed that they would run out, but this i think iz a error,
for they don't show no leak yet.
In the language of the expiring Canadian, on our northern frontier, I
say--"_Vive la Bag-a-tale_."
XXXII.
POLITENESS.
I hav looked into the philosophy ov politeness, with grate fierceness,
and see the thing in the followin light:
Ginowine politeness is a nice mixture ov vanity and good natur,
invigerated bi virtue, and chastened bi policy.
It will take a man along slikly, whose money and impudence, and even
religion, singly, would git stuck.
Nobody can stand, without quailing, before a broadside ov ginowine
politeness; it will make even a Pawnee Injun grow limber.
It mite not save a man from gitting kicked bi a mule, but it would save
him from gitting near enuff tew git kicked.
Thare is one other compound in ginowine perliteness, which gives it
terrifick force, and that is deference.
Deference will win oftener than double sixes.
If you want tew beat a man out ov his opinyun, let him hav his own way
till you cum tew the forks in the road, then you kan take him jist
which road you please.
I am not prepared tew call deference always a virtue, bekause it may
exist, and only be an art, or stratagem.
If it is natural, it quite often degenerates into servility, and if
artifishall, it merges into fraud, or cunning. Love without deference,
is nothing more than a raid.
The deference that exists between equals, (altho pleasant tew look
upon,) is not alwus flatterin tew think about; lions are necessarily
polite tew each other, but when lions bekum polite tew the lams, then
will deference reveal its true sublimity.
Thare is 2 kinds of politeness, the ripe, and the too mutch ripe
politeness; a goose has a grate deal ov this last kind ov politeness; i
have seen them lower their heds while going into a barn door, that was
18 foot high.
JOSH BILLINGS.
XXXIII.
DREAMS.
If yu are handsum, cultivate yure boots; if yu are hoamly, hoe yure
branes.
* * * * *
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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