l naturally ask, why
don't the ministers murder somebody, and make a dead sure thing of it?

THE NAUGHTY BUT NICE CHURCH CHOIR.

You may organize a church choir and think you have got it down fine, and
that every member of it is pious and full of true goodness, and in such a
moment as you think not you will find that one or more of them are full of
the old Harry, and it will break out when you least expect it. There is no
more beautiful sight to the student of nature than a church choir. To see
the members sitting together, demure, devoted and pious looking, you think
that there is never a thought enters their mind that is not connected with
singing anthems, but sometimes you get left.

There is one church choir in Milwaukee that is about as near perfect as a
choir can be. It has been organized for a long time, and has never
quarreled, and the congregation swears by it. When the choir strikes a
devotional attitude it is enough to make an ordinary Christian think of
the angel band above, only the male singers wear whiskers, and the females
wear fashionable clothes.

You would not think that this choir played tricks on each other during the
sermon, but sometimes they do. The choir is furnished with the numbers of
the hymns that are to be sung, by the minister, and they put a bookmark in
the book at the proper place. One morning they all got up to sing, when
the soprano turned pale, as an ace of spades dropped out of her hymn book,
the alto nearly fainted when the queen of hearts dropped at her feet, and
the rest of the pack was distributed around in the other books. They laid
it onto the tenor, but he swore, while the minister was preaching, that he
didn't know one card from another.

One morning last summer, after the tenor had been playing tricks all
spring on the rest of the choir, the soprano brought a chunk of
shoemaker's wax to church. The tenor was arrayed like Solomon in
all his glory, with white pants, and a Seymour coat. The tenor got up to
see who the girl was that came in with the old lady, and while he was up
the soprano put the shoemaker's wax on the chair, and the tenor sat down
on it. They all saw it, and they waited for the result. It was an awful
long prayer, and the church was hot, the tenor was no iceberg himself, and
shoemaker's wax melts at ninety eight degrees Fahrenheit.

[Illustration: THE TENOR ARRAYED IN ALL HIS GLORY.]

The minister finally got to the amen, and read a hymn, the choir th