The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1880-02-14 00:00:00

CUTTINGS FROM AMERICAN PAPERS.

The sheriff in St. Louis is a humorous party. One
of the pipers attacked him br the poor quality of the jurors
he selects, and he immediately summoned the editor of the
paper to serve as juror.
The flail is a contrivance fearfully and wonderfully
made. A Cape Cod man made a great effort to hit a rat with
one, and somehow it got over his shoulder and came up be-
tween his legs and hit him between the eyes and knocked
him senseless. The rat escaped.

An American newspaper wri er is only too pleased
to catch a brother tripping. When one pimps' talked in
Its leading article ot battered thunder," a contemporary
politely desired to know it that had any affinity to
"greased lightning," forcing the explanation that by a
typographies' error "muttered thunder" was the article
Intended.

A farmer offered a tramp hi 3 daughter and half his
farm for three days' work in the harvest field. The tramp
wavered a little at first, but then the colotre of the girl's
eyes didn't suit, and he thought the farm laid a little too
low, so he declined the proposition, stole a hamestrap, and
went on his way.

One very hot day a case was being tried in a court
of law in one of the Western States. The counsel for the
plaintiff had been speaking at great length, and, after re.
(erring to numerous authorities, as about to produce
another imposing volume, when the judge inquired what
was the amount in dispute. On being informed that it was
two dollars, "Well," said he, "The weather is very hat,
I am very old, and also feeble—l'll pay the amount myself."

From the Pond A prominent oitizen in Washington
to a pretty girl: "I want you to come arJutp4 to our house
if you can't get anybody to come around to your house and
fetch you around to our house, I will come around to your
house and fetch you around to our house."
You can't fool an old Qainey girl. When her
"fellow '• risea from her seat in Stle amigo.e between the acts
and says, "I'll be back in a moment," she dazzles him with
one of ner most rell4ble smiles, and pulling him back with
the remark, "I brought some with me," coyly slips into his
hand a pinch of cloves or roasted mine.

The Wabash (Indiana) country has always been
celebrated for the persistency and quality of its fever and
ague. A local physician thus describes the genuine Wabash
article: -" It comes creeping up a fellow's back like a ton of
wild cats: goes crawling through his j Ants like iron spikes,
and is followed by a fever which prohibits the patient from
thinking of anything but Greenland's Icy mountains. It
Isn't the everpother-day ' kind, but gets up with a man at
daylight, and sleeps in the small of his back all night. Ills
teeth feel about six inches long, his pints wobble like a
loose wsgunn wheel, and the shakes are so steady that one
can't hold conversation except by puttingsln dashes."

The morning after a recent wreck, five of the cur-
vivors found themeelves dinging to a floating spar. The
water was very rough, and the battered and exhausted men
had great difficulty. When they were about to let go In
despair, one of the strongest said, "Think of your wives
and children, men, and stick to the spar." The thought
nerved them to renewed exertions, and soon after they were
picked up by a ship. Only one of the number was missing.
They subsequently discovered he was a widower with a
mother-in law.
"To THE OYSTER.-0 mollusc nutritious, bivalve
delicious, there is nothing perniciousrin thy succulent dish,
thou dearly loved fish I Heightening our gaieties, sweeten-
ing asperities, softening oysterittes, stomachic smoothing,
toothsome and soothing. However thou'rt galloped, stewed,
roasted, or scalloped, raw, pickled, or fried, thou still art
the pride and the Queen of the Tide I "