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English Jests and Anecdotes. Various
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The late Duke of York once remarked to Colonel W. at the mess of the 11th regiment, that the colonel was uncommonly bald, and, although a younger man than his royal highness, he stood in more need of a wig. The colonel, who had been of very long standing in the service, and whose promotion had been by no means rapid, informed his royal highness that his baldness could be very easily accounted for. “In what manner?” asked his royal highness, rather eagerly. To which Colonel W. replied, “By junior officers stepping over my head.” The duke was so pleased with the reply, that the gallant colonel obtained promotion in a few days afterwards.
When Brummell was the great oracle on coats, the Duke of Leinster was very anxious to bespeak the approbation of the “Emperor of the Dandies,” for a “cut” which he had just patronised. The duke, in the course of his eulogy on his Schneider, had frequently occasion to use the words “my coat.” “Your coat, my dear fellow!” said Brummell, “what coat?” “Why, this coat,” said Leinster; “this coat that I have on.” Brummell, after regarding the vestment with an air of infinite scorn, walked up to the duke, and, taking the collar between his finger and thumb, as if fearful of contamination, said, “What! duke, do you call that thing a coat?”
Counsellor C – being very infirm and goutified from his excesses, meeting one day with an old friend of his, a permit officer of the custom-house, the latter asked how he did? “Ah?” says the counsellor, “you will not have me long amongst you.” “Come, come,” says the other, “do not be cast down; you shall not have a permit to die yet a while.” “Shall not I, indeed?” says the counsellor; “why, then, I would have you keep a sharp look-out for death; for, if you don’t, I am afraid he will smuggle me.”
The Puritans carried their peculiar tenets into the minutest affairs of life. When Lord Brook, one of the number played at bowls, he would sometimes run after his cast, and cry, “Rub, rub, rub,” in the eager, but absurd hope that such a cry would give effect to his play. On such occasions, his chaplain would run after him with equal eagerness, and earnestly exclaim, “Oh, good my lord, you must leave that to God.”
A bishop of Lincoln adopted the strange conceit of having the grand Scripture sentence, “Fiat Lux,” painted on all the windows of his house. In his hall, in particular, it was so thickly painted, that the reverse of the command was observable, and, as a wag remarked, you could scarcely see for light. A mad scholar, at last, happened to wait upon the bishop, and, observing the opacity of the light, fell a-breaking the windows with his stick. Being carried by the servants into the presence of the bishop, and questioned as to the cause of his conduct, “Why, my lord,” answered he, “I was only obeying your lordship’s commands: Fiat Lux.”
A young preacher, in the time of James I., being appointed to hold forth before the vice-chancellor and heads of the colleges of Oxford, chose for his text, “What! cannot you watch one hour?” which carried a personal allusion, as the vice-chancellor happened to be one of those heavy-headed persons who cannot attend church without falling asleep. The preacher repeating his text in an emphatic manner, at the end of every division of his discourse, the unfortunate vice-chancellor as often awoke; and this happened so often, that, at last, all present could very well see the joke. The vice-chancellor was so nettled at the disturbance he had met with, and the talk it occasioned, that he complained to the Archbishop of Canterbury, who immediately sent for the young man, to reprove him for what he had done. In the course of the conference which ensued between the archbishop and the preacher, the latter gave so many proofs of his wit and good sense, that his grace procured him the honour of preaching before the king. Here also he had his joke: he gave out his text in these words, – “James First and Sixth, Waver not;” which, of course, everybody present saw to be a stroke at the indecisive character of the monarch. James, equally quick-sighted, exclaimed, “He is at me already;” but he was upon the whole so well pleased with this clerical wag, as to make him one of his chaplains in ordinary. He afterwards went to Oxford, and preached a farewell sermon on the text, “Sleep on now, and take your rest.”
It sometimes happens that a candidate for admission into a society, or club, finds every individual member to whom he speaks during the canvass agreeable to his wishes; but when the day of ballot arrives, discovers that there is a majority of black balls. We would recommend to the attention of all such unhappy individuals, the practical joke which a curate once played off under similar circumstances. Being a candidate for some vacant benefice, which was at the disposal of the clergy of the district, he sounded them all beforehand as to their disposition to serve him, and found each more disposed to favour and support him than another. When they met, however, to deliberate on the subject in full synod, he found himself by no means so well treated. Afraid that he should lose his election, he invited the whole to a feast. They, knowing that he should be unable to provide for them from his own resources, sent, as was customary, each a certain portion of the materials of the entertainment – one fish, another flesh, a third wine, a fourth oil, and so forth. The whole he boiled together in one kettle. Of course, when the guests were all arranged, and the food brought in, it was found to be the most unpalatable stuff in the world. They asked what sort of food this was, and he answered with oblique veracity, that it was what they had sent to him. “Ah,” said they, “but what, if cooked each thing by itself, and presented in a separate dish, would have been very good, it is quite disgusting in this hotch-potch style.” “Just so are ye to me,” replied the host; “you are very fair and kind to me when single, and one by one; but when you are gathered together, you are the most disagreeable people in the whole world.”
As William Spencer was contemplating the caricatures at Fores’s, somebody pointed out to him the marine piece, entitled “The Ostend packet in a Squall,” when the wit, without at all sympathizing in the nausea visible on some of the faces represented in the print, exclaimed, “Quodcunque Ostendis mihi sic incredulus odi.”
When Mrs. Mary Robinson published her Sappho and Phaon, she wrote to Mr. Boaden, then editor of a newspaper, in the following terms: – “Mrs. Robertson would thank her friend Boaden for a dozen puffs for Sappho and Phaon.” By mistake of the twopenny post, this note was delivered to Mr. Bowden, the pastry-cook, in the Strand, who sent this answer: – “Mr. Bowden’s respectful compliments to Mrs. Robertson; shall be very happy to serve her; but, as Mrs. R. is not a constant customer, he cannot send the puffs for the young folks without first receiving the money.”
One day, when Sir Isaac Heard was in company with George III., it was announced that his majesty’s horse was ready for hunting. “Sir Isaac,” said the king, “are you a judge of horses?” “In my younger days, please your majesty, I was a great deal among them,” was the reply. “What do you think of this, then?” said the king, who was by this time preparing to mount his favourite; and without waiting for an answer, added, “we call him Perfection.” “A most appropriate name,” replied the courtly herald, bowing as his majesty reached the saddle; “for he bears the best of characters.”
An American gentleman, who was so passionately fond of backgammon, that, even to be a spectator of it much interested him, happened to be surveying a game in which one of the players shewed an evident inferiority to the other. As the game proceeded, he was wrought up to a pitch of perfect fury at the bad play of this individual, who on the other hand, maintained, under all his reverses, a coolness perfectly admirable. “Can you bear that?” cried the American at every hit made by the good player. “Why not?” said the other, with perfect indifference. At last, on the good player gaining an advantage of a particularly brilliant nature, “Can you really bear that?” exclaimed the American. “Why not?” drawled out the loser, with his usual philosophic coolness. “Well,” cried the American,