Produced by Richard Hulse, Barry Abrahamsen, and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from images generously made available by The Internet Archive) _HUMOUR SERIES_ ------------------------------------------- EDITED BY W. H. DIRCKS THE HUMOUR OF AMERICA ------------------------------------------------------------------------ ALREADY ISSUED _FRENCH HUMOUR_ _GERMAN HUMOUR_ _ITALIAN HUMOUR_ _AMERICAN HUMOUR_ _DUTCH HUMOUR_ _IRISH HUMOUR_ _SPANISH HUMOUR_ _RUSSIAN HUMOUR_ [Illustration: “SHE SHRILLY OBSERVES ‘THOMAS JEFFERSON, COME RIGHT INTO THE HOUSE THIS MINIT.’” _See page 130._] ------------------------------------------------------------------------ THE HUMOUR OF AMERICA SELECTED, WITH AN INTRODUCTION AND INDEX OF AMERICAN HUMORISTS, BY JAMES BARR. ILLUSTRATIONS BY C. E. BROCK [Illustration: decoration] THE WALTER SCOTT PUBLISHING CO., LTD., PATERNOSTER SQUARE, LONDON, E.C. CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS, 153-157 FIFTH AVENUE, NEW YORK. 1909. ------------------------------------------------------------------------ CONTENTS. ------- PAGE NOTE xi MY DOG—_Bill Nye_ 1 KNEE-DEEP IN JUNE—_James Whitcomb Riley_ 4 BAKED BEANS AND CULTURE—_Eugene Field_ 8 THE NICE PEOPLE—_H. C. Bunner_ 12 THE EUREKY RAT-TRAP—C. B. Lewis (“_M Quad_”) 24 THE SCHOOL EXAMINATION—_George Washington 28 Cable_ “WOULDN’T YOU LIKE TO KNOW?”—_John G. Saxe_ 35 THE ARTLESS PRATTLE OF CHILDHOOD—_Robert 38 Jones Burdette_ SPEECH ON THE BABIES—_Samuel L. Clemens_ 44 (“_Mark Twain_”) ON CYCLONES—_Bill Nye_ 49 OUR CORRESPONDENT HAS THE HONOUR TO BE—_R. H. 51 Newell_ (“_Orpheus C. Kerr_”) YAWCOB STRAUSS—_Charles Follen Adams_ 61 THE MINISTER’S WOOING—_Harriet Beecher Stowe_ 63 ALBINA MCLUSH—_Nathaniel Parker Willis_ 73 A LONG TIME AGO—_John Barr_ 77