, and with the "sheep's foot" brandished
above our head, shouted to him, "Say Waldo," "Never!" he gasped--

"O my Bigler!" he would have muttered,
But that he "dried up," ere the word was uttered.

At this moment we discovered that we had been laboring under a
"misunderstanding," and through the amicable intervention of the
pressman, who thrust a roller between our faces (which gave the whole
affair a very different complexion), the _matter_ was finally settled on
the most friendly terms--"and without prejudice to the honor of either
party." We write this while sitting without any clothing, except our
left stocking, and the rim of our hat encircling our neck like a "ruff"
of the Elizabethan era--that article of dress having been knocked over
our head at an early stage of the proceedings, and the crown
subsequently torn off, while "the Judge" is sopping his eye with cold
water, in the next room, a small boy standing beside the sufferer with a
basin, and glancing with interest over the advertisements on the second
page of the San Diego Herald, a fair copy of which was struck off upon
the back of his shirt, at the time we held him over the Press. Thus ends
our description of this long anticipated personal collision, of which
the public can believe precisely as much as they please; if they
disbelieve the whole of it, we shall not be at all offended, but can
simply quote as much to the point, what might have been the commencement
of our epitaph, had we fallen in the conflict,

"HERE LIES PHOENIX."

_Phoenixiana._

INCREDULITY.

A GENTLEMAN telling a very improbable story, and observing one of the
company cast a doubtful eye, "Zounds, Sir," says he, "_I saw the thing
happen._" "If you did," says the other, "I _must_ believe it; but I
would not have believed it if I had seen it myself."

A SECOND METHUSELAH.

A STATUARY was directed to inscribe on a monument the age of the
deceased, namely 81. The person who gave the order recollecting,
however, that it should have been 82, desired the sculptor to add one
year more; and the veteran to whose memory this stone was erected, is
recorded as having "departed this life at the advanced age of 811!"

A SCHOOL TEACHER.

A GENTLEMAN from Swampville, State of New York, was telling how many
different occupations he had attempted. Among others he had tried school
teaching. "How long did you teach?" asked a by-stander.

"Wal, I didn't teach long;