Part 43 (1/2)

When Sam Jones was holding his meetings in Dallas, on one occasion he said: ”There's no such thing as a perfect man. Anybody present who has ever known a perfect man stand up.”

n.o.body stood up.

”Those who have ever known a perfect woman, stand up.”

One demure little woman stood up.

”Did you ever know an absolutely perfect woman?” asked Sam, somewhat amazed.

”I didn't know her personally,” replied the little old woman, ”but I have heard a great deal about her. She was my husband's first wife.”

Former President Scott, of the Cincinnati Southern Railroad, was greatly annoyed, when he first took hold of the road, by the claims for horses and cattle killed by trains on their way through Kentucky.

It seemed as though it were not possible for a train to run north or south through Kentucky without killing either a horse or a cow. And every animal killed, however scrawny, scrubby, or miserable it may have been before the accident, always figured in the claims subsequently presented as of the best blood in Kentucky. ”Well,” said Scott one day, after examining a claim, ”I don't know anything that improves stock in Kentucky like crossing it with a locomotive.”

One of a loving couple (watching a pile-driver at work)--”Dear, I feel so sorry for those poor men. They have been trying for the last half hour to lift that thing out, and every time they get it almost to the top, it falls back again.”

Sentinel (on guard)--”Halt! Who comes there?”

The Colonel--”Fool!”

Sentinel--”Advance, fool, and give the countersign.”

”Oh, I'm so sorry I could not come to your 'At Home' yesterday.”

”Dear me, weren't you there?”

”Why of course I was--how very silly of me--I quite forgot.”

A theological student was sent one Sunday to supply a vacant pulpit in a Connecticut valley town. A few days after he received a copy of the weekly paper of that place with the following item marked:

”Rev. ---- of the senior cla.s.s at Yale Seminary supplied the pulpit at the Congregational Church last Sunday, and the church will now be closed three weeks for repairs.”

A Certain Ohio lady with a large sense of religious duty was recently importuned by a tramp. The good religionist, after considerable hesitation, produced a piece of dry bread which she delivered with the following formula, evidently prepared for such occasion:

”Now, sir, not for your sake, nor for my sake, but for G.o.d's sake, I give you this bread.”

The tramp accepted the offering and had got as far as the gate when he suddenly turned and came back where his benefactress was waiting to see him safely out.