The American Joe Miller: A Collection of Yankee Wit and Humor
Philosophy
The American Joe Miller: A Collection of Yankee Wit and Humor
American wit and humor
V. THE PERSONAL LIBERTY BILL.--This is the dog that worried
the cat that killed the rat that eat the malt that lay in the house
that Jeff. built.
VI. CHIEF JUSTICE TANEY.--This is the cow with crumpled horn
that tossed the dog that worried the cat that killed the rat that eat
the malt that lay in the house that Jeff. built.
VII. JAMES BUCHANAN.--This is the maiden all forlorn that
milked the cow with crumpled horn that tossed the dog that worried the
cat that killed the rat that eat the malt that lay in the house that
Jeff. built.
VIII. C. CESH.--This is the man all tattered and torn that
married the maiden all forlorn that milked the cow with crumpled horn
that tossed the dog that worried the cat that killed the rat that eat
the malt that lay in the house that Jeff. built.
IX. PLUNDER.--This is the priest all shaven and shorn that
married the man all tattered and torn to the maiden all forlorn that
milked the cow with crumpled horn that tossed the dog that worried the
cat that killed the rat that eat the malt that lay in the house that
Jeff. built.
PUZZLED.--579.
At the Sutter House, Sacramento, a New Yorker, newly arrived, was
lamenting his condition, and his folly in leaving an abundance at
home, and especially two beautiful daughters, who were just budding
into womanhood, when he asked the other if he had a family. "Yes,
Sir, I have a wife and six children in New York, and I never saw one
of them." After this reply, the couple sat a few minutes in silence,
and then the interrogator again commenced. "Were you ever blind,
Sir?"--"No, Sir." "Did you marry a widow, Sir?"--"No, Sir." Another
lapse of silence. "Did I understand you to say, Sir, that you had a
wife and six children living in New York, and had never seen one of
them?"--"Yes, Sir, I so stated it." Another and a longer pause of
silence. The interrogator again enquired--"How can it be, Sir, that
you never saw one of them?" "Why," was the response, "_one_ of them
was born after I left." "Oh, ah!" and a general laugh followed. After
that, the first New Yorker was especially distinguished as the man who
has six children and never saw one of them.
THE PAPER COLLARS.--580.
It is said the Southerns captured at Mansfield two waggons loaded
with paper collars, and that General Dick Taylor returned the collars
through a flag of truce, with a letter to General Banks, in which the
facetious rebel said:--"I have boiled, baked, and stewed these things,
and can do nothing with them. We cannot eat them. They are a luxury
for which we have no use, and I would like, therefore, to exchange
them for a like quantity of hard tack." The joke is a good one, and
has convulsed the Western boys, who have no great admiration for the
"Liberator of Louisiana." When the Western troops passed General
Banks's head-quarters, coming into Alexandria, they groaned, jeered,
and called aloud, "How about those paper collars?"
CAUSE AND EFFECT.--581.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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