Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1871, by

DICK & FITZGERALD,

in the Office of the Librarian of Congress, Washington, D. C.

PRINTED IN U. S. A.

CONTENTS.

PAGE

INTRODUCTION...............................

PROLOGUE....................................

THE STAGE-STRUCK HERO....

HERE SHE GOES-AND THERE SHE GOES..

PASTOR M'KNOCK'S ADDRESS............

OLD SUGAR'S COURTSHIP.......

THE BACHELOR'S REASONS FOR TAKING A WIFE....

THE SPANISH Valet and the Waiting MAID............

THE JACKDAW OF RHEIMS...................................

JONATHAN AND THE ENGLISHMEN........

ARTEMUS WARD'S TRIP TO RICHMOND...

THE AUCTIONEER AND THE LAWYER.......

MR. AND MRS. SKINNER......

THE BACHELOR AND THE BRIDE........

THE DRUNKARD AND HIS WIFE.....

.....

A WESTERN LAWYER'S PLEA AGAINST THE FACT..

READING A TRAGEDY..

CAST-OFF GARMENTS..

HOW TO CURE A COUGH..

THE SOLDIER'S RETURN..................

THE COUNTRYMEN AND THE ASS..

COME AND GO............

49

51

53

HOW THEY POP THE QUESTION........

THE CLEVER IDIOT...

THE KNIGHTS; OR, BOTH RIGHT AND BOTH WRONG..

HOW THE LAWYER GOT A PATRON SAINT...

JOSH BILLINGS ON LAUGHING........

THE NIGHT AFTER CHRISTMAS..

A CHANGE OF SYSTEM....

THE CITIZEN AND THE THIEVES.

BOGGS'S DOGS......

INTRODUCTION.

WEEPING Philosophers there were of old,
Down whose long faces tears incessant rolled,
Fellows whose eyes, like mountain torrents' beds,
Ran o'er with freshets from their fountain heads—
Water deciding then-as now we see,
Each body's true specific gravity.

If of that whimpering sect one wretch remain
This book will cure his “water on the brain,"
Or change its source, and irrigate his eyes
With gushes born of laughter, not of sighs.
The widow Niobe, of bygone years,

Whom the gods literally "dissolved in tears,"
Reading this volume would her woes have spurned
Or, her grief lightened, to a rainbow turned !

Culled from all sources, here the flowers of wit,
Into a garland for the gay are knit,
And blossoms Humor in his chaplet weaves,
Lend an enrapturing richness to the leaves.
Not ancient quirks from Joseph Miller's mill,
But bran-new jests, the sparkling pages fill;
Puns that would make an undertaker smile,
Or cheer a miser who had lost his pile;
Stories so full of fun, the veriest bore

Must catch their point, and, tickled by it, roar;

5

Dramatic scenes, that in the evening read,
Will send the hearer side-shaken to bed;
Speeches, reported by the Comic Muse,
That fire all Laughter's batteries like a fuse,
And rhythmic hits, so whimsical and terse
That Satire's self seems grinning from each verse.

"Business is business; " but its toil and care,
By Mirth unlightened, who on earth could bear?
The day-fight o'er, its turmoil and its fret,
The mind, unharrassed, hastens to forget,
And the heart-torpid 'mid the jostling throng-
Bounds to the touch of Humor, Wit and Song.
Then turn the gas on, close the shutters tight,
Part the blank darkness from the inner light,
And cabined snugly in the Social Ark,
Set sail with Momus for your Patriarch.
This book's his chart, and stand by it and him
On seas of merriment prepare to swim,
With sheets outspread, a joyous household band,
Bound, with ligh hearts, to Laughter's happy land.

But, “hold, enough!" the nervous reader cries,
This preface long detains me from the prize.
Good wines no "bush" to advertise them need,
And wit, if genuine, for itself can plead.
Right, reader, right! Adieu, proceed alone,
The book's before you-exit chaperone.

J. B.