the sign. The American laughed. The
Englishman did not see the humor of it. The American asked him to read
it again; whereupon the Englishman laughed and said: "Oh, yes; the
grocer might be out."

3-Star.

* * *

You may know the trade classic about the exchange editor. The new owner
of the newspaper asked who that man was in the corner. "The exchange
editor," he was informed. "Well, fire him," said he. "All he seems to do
is sit there and read all day."

* * *

Divers correspondents advise us that the trade classics we have been
printing are old stuff. Yes; that is the peculiar thing about a classic.
Extraordinary, when you come to think of it.

* * *

"Timerio," which is simpler than Esperanto, "will enable citizens of all
nations to understand one another, provided they can read and write."
The inventor has found that 7,006 figures are enough to express any
imaginable idea. But we should think that a picture book would be
simpler.

"You can go to any hotel porter in the world," says the perpetrator of
Timerio, "and make yourself understood by simply handing him a slip of
paper written in my new language." But you can do as well with a picture
of a trunk and a few gestures. The only universal language that is worth
a hoot is the French phrase "comme ca."

* * *

DENATURED LIMERICKS.

There was a young man of Constantinople,
Who used to buy eggs at 35 cents the dozen.
When his father said, "Well,
This is certainly surprising!"
The young man put on his second best waistcoat.

* * *

"The maddest man in Arizona," postcards J. U. H., who has got that far,
"was the one who found, after ten miles' hard drive from his hotel, that
he had picked up the Gideon Bible instead of his Blue Book." Still, they
are both guide books, and they might be interestingly compared.

* * *

To one gadder who asked for a small coffee, the waitress in the rural
hotel said, "A nickel is as small as we've got." Some people try to take
advantage of the bucolic innkeeper.

* * *

"I have not read American literature; I know only Poe," confesses M.
Maeterlinck. Well, that is a good start. For a long time the only French
author we knew was Victor Hugo. Live and learn, say we.

* * *

"He is so funny with the patisserie," says Mme.