e man he
was.

ADAM AND EVE
[Sidenote: _Samuel Butler_]

A little boy and a little girl were looking at a picture of Adam and
Eve.

"Which is Adam and which is Eve?" said one.

"I do not know," said the other, "but I could tell if they had their
clothes on."

FIRE
[Sidenote: _Samuel Butler_]

I was at one the other night, and heard a man say: "That corner stack is
alight now quite nicely." People's sympathies seem generally to be with
the fire so long as no one is in danger of being burned.

THE ELECTRIC LIGHT IN ITS INFANCY
[Sidenote: _Samuel Butler_]

I heard a woman in a 'bus boring her lover about the electric light. She
wanted to know this and that, and the poor lover was helpless. Then she
said she wanted to know how it was regulated. At last she settled down
by saying that she knew it was in its infancy. The word "infancy" seemed
to have a soothing effect upon her, for she said no more, but, leaning
her head against her lover's shoulder, composed herself to slumber.

NEW-LAID EGGS
[Sidenote: _Samuel Butler_]

When I take my Sunday walks in the country, I try to buy a few really
new-laid eggs warm from the nest. At this time of the year (January)
they are very hard to come by, and I have long since invented a sick
wife who has implored me to get a few eggs laid not earlier than the
self-same morning. Of late, as I am getting older, it has become my
daughter, who has just had a little baby. This will generally draw a
new-laid egg, if there is one about the place at all.

At Harrow Weald it has always been my wife who for years has been a
great sufferer and finds a really new-laid egg the one thing she can
digest in the way of solid food. So I turned her on as movingly as I
could not long since, and was at last sold some eggs that were no
better than common shop-eggs, if so good. Next time I went I said my
poor wife had been made seriously ill by them; it was no good trying to
deceive her; she could tell a new-laid egg from a bad one as well as any
woman in London, and she had such a high temper that it was very
unpleasant for me when she found herself disappointed.

"Ah! sir," said the landlady, "but you would not like to lose her."

"Ma'am," I replied, "I must not allow my thoughts to wander in that
direction. But it's no use bringing her stale eggs, anyhow."

SNAPSHOTTING A BISHOP
[Sidenote: _Samuel Butler_]

I must some day write about how I hunted the late Bishop of Carlisle
wi