Part 42 (2/2)

At a certain country election of a member of Parliament in the Highlands, the popular candidate waited on a shoemaker to solicit his vote.

”Get out of my house, sir,” said the shoemaker; and the gentleman was forced to retire accordingly. The cobbler, however, followed him and called him back, saying, ”You turned me off from your estate, sir, and I was determined to turn you out of my house; but for all that, I'll give you my vote.”

=How Greyhounds are Produced=

At a certain mansion, notorious for its scanty fare, a gentleman was inquiring of the gardener about a dog which he had given to the laird some time before. The gardener showed him a lank greyhound, on which the gentleman said: ”No, no; the dog I gave your master was a mastiff, not a greyhound”; to which the gardener quietly answered:

”Indeed, sir, ony dog would soon be turned into a greyhound if it stoppit lang here.”

=Vanity Scathingly Reproved=

Burns was dining with Maxwell of Terraughty, when one of the guests chose to talk of the dukes and earls with whom he had drank or dined, till the host and others got tired of him. Burns, however, silenced him with an epigram:

”What of earls, with whom you have supped?

And of dukes, that you dined with yestreen?

Lord! a louse, sir, is still but a louse, Though it crawls on the curls of a queen.”

=Gratifying Industry!=

In Galloway large craigs are met with having ancient writing on them.

One on the farm of Knockleby has, cut deep on the upper side:

”Lift me up and I'll tell you more.”

A number of people gathered to this craig, and succeeded in lifting it up, in hopes of being well repaid; but, instead of finding any gold, they found written on it:

”Lay me down as I was before.”

=The Force of Habit=

Some years ago a Scotch gentleman, who went to London for the first time, took the uppermost story of a lodging-house, and was very much surprised to get what he thought the genteelest place of the whole at the lowest price. His friends who came to see him, in vain acquainted him with the mistake he had been guilty of.

”He ken't very weel,” he said, ”what gentility was; and after having lived all his life in a sixth story, he had not come to London to live upon the ground.”

=Significant Advice=

A church in the north country which required a pastor had a beadle who took an active interest in all the proceedings taken to fill up the vacancy.

One of the candidates, after the afternoon service was over, put off his cloak in the vestry and slipped into the church, in which our worthy was just putting things to rights.

”I was just taking a look at the church,” said the minister.

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