PESSIMISM

TED--"What's the difference between a pessimist and a cynic?"

NED--"The pessimist is without hope, while the cynic is sure you'll always be able to get a drink if you have the price."--_Life_.

             _The Pessimist_

  Nothing to do but work,     Nothing to eat but food,   Nothing to wear but clothes,     To keep one from going nude.

  Nothing to breathe but air,     Quick as a flash 'tis gone;   Nowhere to fall but off,     Nowhere to stand but on.

  Nothing to comb but hair,     Nowhere to sleep but in bed,   Nothing to weep but tears,     Nothing to bury but dead.

  Nothing to sing but songs,     Ah, well, alas! alack!   Nowhere to go but out,     Nowhere to come but back.

  Nothing to see but sights,     Nothing to quench but thirst,   Nothing to have but what we've got     Thus through life we are cursed.

  Nothing to strike but a gait;     Everything moves that goes.   Nothing at all but common sense     Can ever withstand these woes.

  --_Ben King_.

It was a mile over Mount Clemens.

The pilot of the plane from Selfridge Field was giving a visiting officer his first air voyage.

He cut off the motor.

"See those people?" shouted the pilot. "Fifty per cent of them think we are going to fall."

"They've got nothing on us," was the reply that streamed for a half a mile back of the plane; "fifty per cent of us do."

THE PESSIMIST--"The best luck any man can have is never to have been born; but that seldom happens to any one."

Said the weather prophet, "I think it is safest always to predict bad weather."

"Why's that?"

"Well, people are ready to forgive you if you turn out to be wrong."

Out at the front two regiments, returning to the trenches, chanced to meet. There was the usual exchange of wit.

"When's the bloomin' war goin' to end?" asked one north-country lad.

"Dunno," replied one of the southshires. "We've planted some daffydils in front of our trench."

"Bloomin' optimists!" snorted the man from the north. "We've planted acorns."

_See also_ Irish bulls; Optimism.

PHILADELPHIA

The city of Philadelphia offers a liberal reward for the most important contribution toward civic improvement. A fine opportunity for manufacturers of alarm clocks.

PHILANTHROPISTS

WEALTHY BENEFACTRESS (stopping in at the hospital)--"Well, we'll bring the car tomorrow, and take some of your patients for a drive. And, by the bye, nurse, you might pick out some with bandages that show--the last party might not have been wounded at all, as far as anybody in the streets could see."--_Punch_.

PHILOSOPHY

Rube Wilkins says--"You can't get ahead while you're kickin' any more than a mule can."

All philosophy lies in two words, "sustain" and "abstain." --_Epictetus_.

The philosophy of one century is the common sense of the next.--_Henry Ward Beecher_.

Philosophy, while it soothes the reason, damps the ambition. --_Bulwer-Lytton_.

PHYSICIANS AND SURGEONS

_See_ Doctors.

PITTSBURG

PITTSBURG MAN (telephoning to Long Island from New York)--"Ten cents? Why, in Pittsburg we can telephone to Hades for a nickel."

CENTRAL--"But this is a long-distance call."

PLEASURE

Pleasures are like liqueurs: they must be drunk but in small glasses.--_Romainville_.

POETRY

EDITOR--"This isn't poetry, my dear man; it's merely an escape of gas."

WOULD-BE CONTRIBUTOR--"Ah, I see! Something wrong with the meter."

  Your poem must _eternal_ be,     Dear sir, it can not fail,   For 'tis incomprehensible,     And wants both _head_ and _tail_.

  --_S.T. Coleridge_.

"What is poetry of motion?"

"The kind that's always going from one editor to another."

They were dancing the one-step. The music was heavenly. The swish of her silken skirts was divine. The fragrance of the roses upon her bosom was really intoxicating.

"Ah," she smiled, sweetly, with an arch look up into his face, "you remind me of one of Whitman's poems."

A sudden dizziness seemed to seize him. It was as if he were floating in a dream. When he had sufficiently gained his breath he spoke:

"Which one?"

"Oh, any one," she replied. "The feet are mixed in all of them."--_Everybody's_.

POETS

  Sir, I admit your general rule,   That every poet is a fool,   But you yourself may serve to show it,   That every fool is not a poet.

  --_Alexander Pope_.

Witter Bynner is said to have worked off a pretty good one at the Poetry Society banquet. Some one asked him if Burns and Noyes could not be likened to each other. Bynner replied: "Well, you can feel Burns, while you can only hear Noyes."

When Masefield, the British poet, visited Yale, he finished his evening's talk and readings earlier than was expected, and the chairman of the meeting suggested that the poet should read any poem requested by the audience. The audience, as usually happens, was dumb. It was an awkward moment. Finally, one of the younger English Department members rushed agitatedly into the breach.

"Won't you please read 'The Tewksbury Road,' Mr. Masefield?"

The poet looked amazed, then puzzled, and at last said with a hesitating desire not to offend "these singular Americans": "Ah--er--I--ah!--would be charmed to do so--really--but I've just read it!"

Professor Alfred Noyes, the English poet, it is known, likes very much to read his works aloud to his friends, and at Princeton, with so many young men under him, he is usually able to gratify this liking to the full. The other day Professor Noyes said to a junior who had called about an examination: "Wait a minute. Don't go yet. I want to show you the proofs of my new book of poems." But the junior made for the door frantically. "No, no," he said. "I don't need proofs. Your word is enough for me, professor."

HE--"I tore up that poem I wrote last week."

SHE--"Tore it up? Why, that was the best thing you ever did."

The little agricultural village had been billed with "Lecture on Keats" for over a fortnight. The evening arrived at length, bringing the lecturer ready to discourse on the poet. The advertised chairman, taken ill at the last moment, was replaced by a local farmer. This worthy introduced the lecturer and terminated his remarks by saying:

"And now, my friends, we shall soon all know what 1 personally have often wondered--what are Keats?"

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