An aboriginal American was asked if he had known the Bishop of Quebec? "Yes, yes." "And how did you like him?" "Oh, vastly!" "But how did you happen to know him?" "Happen to know him! _Why, I ate a piece of him._" PRESIDENT LINCOLN'S FIRST POLITICAL SPEECH.--469. Abraham Lincoln made his first political speech in 1832, when he was a candidate for the Illinois Legislature. His opponent had wearied the audience by a long speech, leaving Mr. L. but a short time in which to present his views. He condensed all he had to say into a few words, as follows--"Gentlemen, Fellow-citizens: I presume you all know who I am. I am humble Abraham Lincoln. I have been solicited by many friends to become a candidate for the Legislature. My politics are short and sweet, like an old woman's dance. I am in favour of a national bank. I am in favour of the internal improvement system, and a high protective tariff. These are my sentiments and political principles. If elected, I shall be thankful; if not, it will be all the same." TAKE CARE OF YOUR BAGGAGE.--470. Travellers should be careful to entrust their baggage to proper persons only, as a gentleman, not long ago, on alighting from the train at Washington, entrusted his wife to a stranger, and she has not been heard of since. AMERICAN COMPETITION.--471. It is in the nature of an American, says one, to be always in fear lest his neighbour should arrive before him. If one hundred Americans were about to be shot, they would fight for precedence, such are their habits of competition. AMERICAN DEFINITIONS.--472. _Progress of Time._--A pedler going through the land with wooden clocks.--_Honesty_ (obsolete): A term formerly used in the case of a man who had paid for his newspapers, and the coat on his back.--_Rigid Justice_: A juror in a murder case fast asleep. TWO THINGS UNEXPECTED.--473. Josh Billings says: "There air 2 things in this wurld for which we air never fully prepared, and those air twins." PERPETUAL MOTION.--474. A New York Paper advertises that the owner of the perpetual motion lately exhibiting at Boston has absconded without paying the man who turned the crank in the cellar. ARTEMUS WARD ON REORGANIZATION.--475.