There lives in New Hampshire a man called Joe, a fellow noted for the tough lies he can tell. A correspondent informs us that Joe called in at Holton's lately, and found him almost choked with smoke, when he suggested, "You don't know as much about managing smoky chimneys as I do, squire, or you'd cure 'em." "Ah!" said Holton, with interest, "did you ever see a smoky chimney cured?" "Seen it?" said old Joe, "I think I have. I had the worst one in Seaboard county once, and I cured it a little too much." "How was that?" asked Holton. "Why, you see," said Joe, "I built a little house out yonder, at Wolf Hollow, ten or twelve years ago. Jim Bush, the fellow that built the chimneys, kept blind drunk three-quarters of the time, and crazy drunk the other. I told him I thought he'd have something wrong; but he stuck to it and finished the house. Well, we moved in, and built a fire the next morning to boil the tea-kettle. All the smoke came through the room and went out of the windows; not a bit went up the flues. We tried it for two or three days, and it got worse and worse. By and by it came on to rain, and the rain began to come down the chimney. It put the fire out in a minute, and directly it came down by the pailful. We had to get the baby off the floor as soon as we could, or it would have been drowned. In fifteen minutes the water stood knee-deep on the floor. I pretty soon saw what was the matter. The drunken cuss had put the chimney wrong end up, and it drawed downwards. It gathered all the rain within a hundred yards, and poured it down by bucketfuls." "Well, that was unfortunate," remarked Holton, "but what in the world did you do with the house? Surely you never cured that chimney?" "Didn't I, though?" answered old Joe; "yes, I did." "How?" asked Holton. "Turned it the other end up," said the incorrigible, "and then you ought to have seen it draw. That was the way I cured it too much." "Drew too much?" asked Holton. "Well, squire, you may judge for yourself," said old Joe. "Pretty soon after we got the chimney down the other end up, I missed one of the chairs out of the room, and directly I see'd another of 'em shooting towards the fireplace. Next the table went, and I see the back log going up. Then I grabbed the old woman under one arm and the baby under t'other and started; but just as I got to the door I see'd the cat going across the floor backwards, holding on with her claws to the carpet, yelling awfully. It wasn't no use. I just see her going over the top of the chimney, and that was the last of her." "Well, what did you do then?" asked Holton; "of course you could not live in such a house?" "Couldn't I, though?" said Joe; "but I did; I put a poultice on the jamb of the fireplace, and that drawed t'other way, so we had no more trouble." This is what we call hard lying. BUSINESS AND AFFLICTION.--14.