The So-called Human Race

“I wish to buy a book for a young lady,” infoed the blond mustached one to a clerk at McClurg’s. “She has both the ‘Rubaiyat’ and ‘A Tale of Two Cities.’ What do you advise?” O. B. W.

“I never could get to Detour, either,” communicates Jezebel, “but recently, on a train, I passed through Derail, which seems to be a fairly thriving village, although some of the houses need paint.”

Old readers detour here —

YES, YES

Sir: Herbert F. Antunes is a piano tuner in Evanston. L. L. B.

Resume main pike.

YE STUFF

Sir: “Yee Laundry” reads the sign over Yee Hing’s washee at Deming, N. M. Wherein ye olde world is joined with ye olde English. C. P. A.

“Henry Ford is poverty stricken intellectually, morally, and spiritually.” – Comrade Spargo.

Hint for Briggs: “Wonder what Henry Ford thinks about?”

Powell’s taxicab service in Polo, Ill., offers “a rattle with every ride,” and for the life of us we can’t imagine the kind of car employed.

Speaking of Detour and Derail, “I wonder,” wonders A. T., “whether in your travels you ever got to Goslow.”

DATED

Sir: From the Blue Book: “Pleasant View. Saloon on left corner. Turn left. Then follow winding road.” A. C.

YOU KNOW THE TUNE

“No girl,” say the rules of Northwestern University, “must walk the campus after dusk, unless to the library or to lectures, or for purposes of learning.”

I’m a merry little campus maid,
The campus sward I rove,
Picking Greek roots all the day
And learning how to love.

Considering “A Treasury of English Prose,” – prose that rivals great poetry – Mr. J. C. Squire came to an interesting conclusion – that “there is an established, an inevitable, manner into which an Englishman will rise when his ideas and images lift into grandeur; the style of the Authorized Version.”

Auguste Comte listed five hundred and fifty-eight men and women who could be considered great in the history of the world. An English writer, striking from the list names that he had never heard of before, arrives at the “astounding fact” that since the dawn of history fewer than three hundred and fifty great men have lived. We too are astounded. We had no notion there were so many.

“Great Britain,” says Lloyd George, “must be freed of ignorance, insobriety, penury, and the tyranny of man over man.” That ought not to require more than three or four glacial periods.

The Woman’s Club asks for “jingles for the jaw.” Well, here are two from C. L. Edson. Try them on your jaw:

THE TREE TOADS

A tree toad loved a she toad
That lived up in a tree;
She was a three-toed tree toad,
But a two-toed toad was he.

The two-toed tree toad tried to win
The she toad’s friendly nod;
For the two-toed tree toad loved the ground
That the three-toed tree toad trod.

But vainly the two-toed tree toad tried —
He couldn’t please her whim;
In her tree toad bower
With her V-toe power,
The she toad vetoed him.

THE RIDER AND THE ADDER

Miss Tudor was a rider in a famous circus show;
For a pet she had an adder – and the adder loved her so!

She fed the adder dodder. It’s a plant that live on air,
Could you find an odder fodder if you hunted everywhere?

Miss Tudor bought some madder. It’s a color rather rare,
And it made the adder shudder when Miss Tudor dyed her hair.

Her hair was soft as eider when she tried her madder dye;
Then, it had an odder odor – and was redder than the sky.

The adder couldn’t chide ’er. It could only idle stare,
But a sadder adder eyed ’er when the rider dyed ’er hair.

One of our readers was dozing in the lobby of a Boston hotel when he was aroused by an altercation near the cigar stand. A was wagering B that the name of the heroine of “The Scarlet Letter” was Hester Thorne, B maintaining that it was Hester Prim. The manager of the hotel was about to call the police, forgetting that there were none, when the gum-chewing divinity behind the case awarded the decision to B, and the crowd reluctantly dispersed.

We have on hand a column of favorite wheezes sent in response to our invitation, and the only reason we have not printed them is the preponderance of our own stuff. Naturally, or not, we are better amused by the wheezes of contributors. Frexample the following evoked a smile:

“On the train running into Tulsa,” wrote a gadder, “a native was fooling with the roller curtain, when suddenly it flew up with a snap. He looked bewildered, stuck his head out of the window, and finally said to himself, ‘Well, I reckon that’s the last they’ll see of that derned thing!’”

As we have been informed, and as we repeat for the benefit of the School of Journalism, there is nothing to running a column except the knack of writing more or less apt headlines. And so for the instruction of students whose ambition may be vaulting in that direction we will reopen a short court in head-writing. See what you can do with the divorce suit of Hazel Nutt against John P. Nutt, filed in a Florida court.

As to the divorce suit of Hazel Nutt vs. John P. Nutt, M. M. C. offers, “Shucks!”

Another happy headline for the Nutt vs. Nutt divorce suit, suggested by Battle Creek: “Two Nutts Will Soon Be Loose.”

The hand-painted baby-blue pencil for the best headline last week goes to the artist on the San Francisco Chronicle for the following:

“Prehistoric Skulls Found Digging Wells.”

We see by the paper – our favorite medium of information – that Duluth is to have an evening of “wrestling and dance.” A keen eye can probably tell the difference.

The drawn-work decanter, prize for the best headline for the Nutt vs. Nutt divorce case, is awarded to G. C. H. for his inspiration, “Nutts for the Lawyers.”