Toaster's Handbook Part 75

As no man is born an artist, so no man is born an angler.--_Izaak Walton_.

FIs.h.i.+NG

A man was telling some friends about a proposed fis.h.i.+ng trip to a lake in Colorado which he had in contemplation.

"Are there any trout out there?" asked one friend.

"Thousands of 'em," replied Mr. Wharry.

"Will they bite easily?" asked another friend.

"Will they?" said Mr. Wharry. "Why they're absolutely vicious. A man has to hide behind a tree to bait a hook."

"I got a bite--I got a bite!" sang out a tiny girl member of a fis.h.i.+ng party. But when an older brother hurriedly drew in the line there was only a bare hook. "Where's the fish?" he asked. "He unbit and div," said the child.

The late Justice Brewer was with a party of New York friends on a fis.h.i.+ng trip in the Adirondacks, and around the camp fire one evening the talk naturally ran on big fish. When it came his turn the jurist began, uncertain as to how he was going to come out:

"We were fis.h.i.+ng one time on the Grand Banks for--er--for--"

"Whales," somebody suggested.

"No," said the Justice, "we were baiting with whales."

"Lo, Jim! Fis.h.i.+n'?"

"Naw; drowning worms."

We may say of angling as Dr. Boteler said of strawberries: "Doubtless G.o.d could have made a better berry, but doubtless G.o.d never did"; and so (if I might be judge), G.o.d never did make a more calm, quiet, innocent recreation than angling.--_Izaak Walton_.

FLATS

"h.e.l.lo, Tom, old man, got your new flat fitted up yet?"

"Not quite," answered the friend. "Say, do you know where I can buy a folding toothbrush?"

She hadn't told her mother yet of their first quarrel, but she took refuge in a flood of tears.

"Before we were married you said you'd lay down your life for me," she sobbed.

"I know it," he returned solemnly; "but this confounded flat is so tiny that there's no place to lay anything down."

FLATTERY

With a sigh she laid down the magazine article upon Daniel O'Connell.

"The day of great men," she said, "is gone forever."

"But the day of beautiful women is not," he responded.

She smiled and blushed. "I was only joking," she explained, hurriedly.

MAGISTRATE (about to commit for trial)--"You certainly effected the robbery in a remarkably ingenious way; in fact, with quite exceptional cunning."

PRISONER--"Now, yer honor, no flattery, please; no flattery, I begs yer."

OLD MAID--"But why should a great strong man like you be found begging?"

WAYFARER--"Dear lady, it is the only profession I know in which a gentleman can address a beautiful woman without an introduction."

William ---- was said to be the ugliest, though the most lovable, man in Louisiana. On returning to the plantation after a short absence, his brother said:

"Willie, I met in New Orleans a Mrs. Forrester who is a great admirer of yours. She said, though, that it wasn't so much the brillancy of your mental attainments as your marvelous physical and facial beauty which charmed and delighted her."

"Edmund," cried William earnestly, "that is a wicked lie, but tell it to me again!"

"You seem to be an able-bodied man. You ought to be strong enough to work."

"I know, mum. And you seem to be beautiful enough to go on the stage, but evidently you prefer the simple life."

After that speech he got a square meal and no reference to the woodpile.

O, that men's ears should be To counsel deaf, but not to flattery!

--_Shakespeare_.