LONDON

A teacher asked her class to write an essay on London. She was surprised to read the following in one attempt:

"The people of London are noted for their stupidity."

The young author was asked how he got that idea.

"Please, miss," was the reply, "it says in the text-books the population of London is very dense."

"Hiram writes that the first day he was in London he lost L12."

"Great Caesar's ghost! Ain't they got any health laws in that town?"

LOST AND FOUND

OLD GENTLEMAN (in street car)--"Has anyone here dropped a roll of bills, with a rubber elastic around them?"

"Yes, I have!" cried a dozen at once.

OLD GENTLEMAN (calmly)--"Well, I've just picked up the elastic."

"Cohn, I've lost my pocketbook."

"Have you looked by your pockets?"

"Sure, all but der left-hand hip pocket."

"Vell, vy don't you look in dot?"

"Because if it ain't dere I'll drop dead!"

The following exchange of courtesy was recently chronicled in a German paper's advertisements:

"The gentleman who found a brown purse, containing a sum of money, in the Blumenstrasse, is requested to forward it to the address of the loser, as he is recognized."

A couple of days later appeared the response, which, altho courteous, had an elusive air, to say the least:

"The recognized gentleman who picked up a brown purse in the Blumenstrasse requests the loser to call at his house at a convenient day."

A small boy came hurriedly down the street, and halted breathlessly in front of a stranger going in the same direction.

"Have you lost half a crown?" he asked with his hand in his pocket.

"Y-es, yes, I believe I have!" said the stranger feeling in his pockets. "Have you found one?"

"Oh, no," said the small boy. "I just want to see how many have been lost today. Yours makes fifty-four!"

The young lady from New York was inclined to belittle things.

"Why," she remarked, "I could find my way up this mountain path alone."

"Wal," responded the native, "a young couple went up this path last year and never came back."

"Oh, my! Were they lost?"

"Nope," was the reply, "they went down the other side!"

The other day when the beach was crowded, a small boy, looking rather bewildered, approached a police officer and said, "Please, sir, have you seen anything of a lady around here?"

"Why, yes," answered the officer, "I've seen several."

"Well, have you seen any without a little boy?"

"Yes."

"Well," said the little chap, as a relieved look crossed his face, "I'm the little boy. Where's the lady?"

One does not mean to be personal, but, if the young man who sat in the chair where a lady had left a dish of maple sugar to cool at the festival the other evening, will return the saucer, he will save himself further trouble.

LOVE

             _Outwitted_

  He drew a circle that shut me out   Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout.   But Love and I had the wit to win,   We drew a circle that took him in.

  --_Edwin Markham_.

DAUGHTER--"Oh, father, how grand it is to be alive! The world is too good for anything. Why isn't every one happy?"

FATHER--"Who is he this time?"

EDITH--"How does Fred make love?"

MARIE--"Well, I should define it as unskilled labor."

MAG.--"Wot is 'platonic affection,' Liz? Is it love?"

LIZ.--"Well, no;--it ain't _true_ love! Dere ain't no quarreling in it, ner no fighting, ner worrying, ner hocking, ner drinking, ner getting arrested fer non-support, ner _nuthin'_ wot's really passionate!"

             _Why_

  Do you know why the rabbits are caught in the snare     Or the tabby cat's shot on the tiles?   Why the tigers and lions creep out of their lair?     Why an ostrich will travel for miles?   Do you know why a sane man will whimper and cry     And weep o'er a ribbon or glove?   Why a cook will put sugar for salt in a pie?     Do you know? Well, I'll tell you--it's Love.

  --_H.P. Stevens_.

PAPA--"Why, hang it, girl, that fellow only earns nine dollars a week!"

PLEADING DAUGHTER--"Yes; but, daddy, dear, a week passes so quickly when you're fond of one another."--_Judge_.

"Love makes the world go 'round," quoted the Parlor Philosopher.

"Yes, but it has to be cranked," replied the Mere Man. "It isn't a self-starter."

             _Cupid_

  Why was Cupid a boy,     And why a boy was he?   He should have been a girl,     For aught that I can see.

  For he shoots with his bow,     And a girl shoots with her eye;   And they both are merry and glad,     And laugh when we do cry.

  Then to make Cupid a boy     Was surely a woman's plan,   For a boy never learns so much     Till he has become a man.

  And then he's so pierced with cares,     And wounded with arrowy smarts,   That the whole business of his life     Is to pick out the heads of the darts.

  --_William Blake_.

Partake of love as a temperate man partakes of wine: do not become intoxicated.--_A. de Musset_.

LUCK

VICAR--"Nothing to be thankful for! Why, think of poor old Hodge losing his wife through the flu!"

GILES--"Well, that don't do me no good. I ain't Hodge."

  Good luck is the gayest of all gay girls;     Long in one place she will not stay:   Back from your brow she strokes the curls,     Kisses you quick and flies away.

  But Madame Bad Luck soberly comes     And stays--no fancy has she for flitting;   Snatches of true-love songs she hums,     And sits by your bed, and brings her knitting.

  --_John Hay_.

YOUNG SON--"What is luck, father?"

FATHER--"Luck, my son, is something that enables another fellow to succeed where we have failed."