*HE COULD CURE IT* Dr. William Osler, of Johns Hopkins and Oxford, tells this story: An old darky quack, well known in a certain section of the South, was passing the house of a planter whose wife was reported to be dangerously ill. Stopping at the gate he called to one of the hands: "I say, Rastus, how’s the missus?" "Well," replied Rastus, "the doctah done say dis mawnin’ dat she convalescent." "Humph! Dat ain’t nothin’, chile," said the old quack, with an air of superior wisdom. "Why, I’ve done cured convalescence in twenty-foah hours!" *THE NEW NATURAL HISTORY* A hard-working fancy dealer had ransacked the whole shop in his efforts to please an old lady who wanted to purchase a present--"anything real nice"--for her granddaughter. For the fifteenth time she picked up and critically examined a neat little satchel. "Are you quite sure that this is genuine alligator skin?" she inquired. "Positive, madam," quoth the dealer. "I shot that alligator myself." "It looks rather soiled," said the lady. "That, madam, is where it struck the ground when it tumbled off the tree." *DURABILITY WANTED* A New York editor tells a story of a man who was the father of twelve children, all of whom had been rocked to sleep by the same toe and in the same cradle. The toe stood it all right, but the cradle had begun to show signs of wear toward the end of the rocking period of the twelfth. "John," said the wife one day, looking fondly at the cradle at her side, "this old cradle has done good service, but it is about worn out. I am afraid it is nearly gone!" "That’s right," assented the husband. Reaching into his pocket he pulled out a ten dollar bill. "Here you are. Next time you go to the city get a new one. Get a good one this time; one that’ll last." *MEN NOT EQUAL* Some years ago the Chief Justice of the United States found that the tire of one of his wheels was loose and kept slipping off. Coming to a little stream he drove into it and got one little section of the wheel wet; then drove out and backed his horse, and the same part of the wheel went into the water again. Thus he kept going backward and forward, all the time wetting the same part of the wheel. A negro saw the situation and told the justice to back into the water again. He did so, and the negro took hold of the spokes of the wheel and, turning it slowly, soon had it wet all around. "Why, I never thought of that," cried the chief justice. "Well," replied the darky, "some men just nat’ly have more sense than others." *CRUELTY OF SCIENCE* A little boy was once given two images of plaster, coated on the outside with pink sugar. He wanted to eat the images, but he was warned on no account to do so. "They are poison," he was told. "If you eat them, it will kill you."