aloud:

"It's come at last! I know you've been talking all this while, but I
haven't heard a single word."

The answer, given with a grin, was explicit and satisfying to the
worried deaf man:

"I hain't been talkin'--jest a-chewin'."

DEDICATION

The visitor to the poet's wife expressed her surprise that the man of
genius had failed to dedicate any one of his volumes to the said wife.
Whereupon, said wife became flustered, and declared tartly:

"I never thought of that. As soon as you are gone, I'll look through all
his books, and if that's so, I never will forgive him!"

DEFINITION

The schoolboy, after profound thought, wrote this definition of the word
"spine," at his teacher's request.

"A spine is a long, limber bone. Your head sets on one end and you set
on the other."

DEGREES IN DEGRADATION

Phil May, the artist, when once down on his luck in Australia, took a
job as waiter in a very low-class restaurant. An acquaintance came into
the place to dine, and was aghast when he discovered the artist in his
waiter.

"My God!" he whispered. "To find you in such a place as this."

Phil May smiled, as he retorted:

"Oh, but, you see, I don't eat here."

DELAY

A woman in the mountains of Tennessee was seated in the doorway of the
cabin, busily eating some pig's feet. A neighbor hurried up to tell of
how her husband had become engaged in a saloon brawl and had been shot
to death. The widow continued munching on a pig's foot in silence while
she listened to the harrowing news. As the narrator paused, she spoke
thickly from her crowded mouth:

"Jest wait till I finish this-here pig's trotter, an' ye'll hear some
hollerin' as is hollerin'."

DEVIL

Some wasps built their nests during the week in a Scotch clergyman's
best breeches. On the Sabbath as he warmed up to his preaching, the
wasps, too, warmed up, with the result that presently the minister was
leaping about like a jack in the box, and slapping his lower anatomy
with great vigor, to the amazement of the congregation.

"Be calm, brethren," he shouted. "The word of God is in my mouth, but
the De'il's in my breeches!"

DIET

The young lady, who was something of a food fadist, was on a visit to a
coast fishing village. She questioned her host as to the general diet of
the natives, and was told that they subsisted almost entirely on fish.
The girl protested:

"But fish is a brain food, and these folks are really the most
unint