1230. A country farmer’s wife in the north, having a nice lad for her son, about seven years old, bid him fetch home the kine from the field, to be milked in the yard; there were six in number. The boy went as bid, and drove home but five. Marry, said his mother, what’s become of the sixth? She is turned down that deep dirty lane where I could not come at her, and I think she is going to the devil. To the devil! said the mother; nay, then stay, Bob, thy father shall go, as he has boots on. 1231. There was a man whose nose leaned more towards one side than the other; a friend disposed to have a laugh with him, said, I know what your nose is not made of, and I know of what it is. First, I can assure you, it is not made of wheat, and secondly, I will be fudged by all the company, if it be not made a-rye. 1232. A traveller reported to be drowned, a friend of his being in company, when the letters came that brought the first news of his death, fetched a deep sigh, with these words, God rest his soul, for he has gone the way of all flesh. Nay, said another then standing by, if he is drowned, he has gone the way of all fish. 1233. One of the great stone letters fell from the top of Northampton House and dashed out a scholar’s brains. It happened not long after, that a good honest fellow, who could neither read nor write, being in company with three or four very ingenious gentlemen, upon a sudden broke out into a deep melancholy, and said, Well, I thank God I can neither read nor write. One of the others smiling, replied, You speak strangely, for I and the rest here thank God we can do both. All’s one for that, said he, yet let myself and others be thankful we can do neither. They asked his reason; he gave them this explanation, Because, said he, we can walk the street with a security that you bookmen cannot. They desired him to explain himself. Why, said he, if one letter falling from the top of a house, had the power to knock out the brains of a scholar, what safety should we live in, to be troubled with four and twenty letters? Now, thank heaven, I have nothing to do with letters, and I cannot see that letters have anything to do with me. 1234. Two country fellows meeting at an assizes in the country, one asked the other, What news, and how many were condemned to suffer? The other answered, This hath been the strangest session that ever was in my time; I have not known the like, for there is no execution at all; and is it not worth observation, that so many justices should sit on the bench, and not one thought proper to be hanged? 1235. Miss Pope was one evening in the green-room, commenting on the excellencies of Garrick, when, amongst other things, she said, he had the most wonderful eye imaginable―an eye, to use a vulgar phrase, that would penetrate through a deal board. Ay, cried Wewitzer, I now understand what they call a gimlet eye.