Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1884-08-17
THE ANECDOTE.
Bill Nye Has Something to Say About
the Great Nuisance OF the Day.

Bill Nye Has Something to Say About
the Great Nuisance of the Day.
Out Of every one thousand people, born
into this world of sin and sorrow, nine
hundred and ninety-nine either do not
know a good story when they hear il, for
know how to repeat it themselves, or
haven't good judgment about when to in
trOdUce it. I lay down this grand pTinci-
. pie, as am laying down all my grand prin-
ciples this season, withOutfear of success
/ ful contradiction.
listened to a very fair amateur cam
I paign speech the other evenirg-very fair,
with one exception. The anecdotes were
not made tO illustrate the speech, but the
speech had been distorted to fit the anec-
dOtes. You know an artist sometimes
strikes a gO01 idea in picture and some
body writes up to the illustration instead
of writing a good thing and then having it
illustrated incidentally. That's the way
Ii was with that speech.
To discriminate between a good story
and poor one, to remember the good ones
and forget the POOR ones, to bring in the
right one at the right moment and to DO it
as naturally as the startled mud turtle
seeks the bosom Of the rolling deep,
requires sang frOid, nalVete, chic, pro
bono publicO and horse sense. These
qualities are rarely united ia one lndivid-
.ual. Chic is useless without pro bono
publicO and both are n. G.. without what
Herbert Spencer has so charmIngly char
acteriZed as horse cense.
The world is peOp-ed with deniZeEs who
afe constantly telling anecdotes that
claim TO be tacetiOue, but do not seem to
re. there. How often is the Joyous group
thrown into spasms by the scrap book
stOry-teller, who is always a century
behind the patent insiCes, and who joyous
l. sCws the seeds Of hypOchOndria every
where.
Some men can never take hint TLey
90 through life telling the same gloom
envlrC ned funny stories. cheertully snow
ing their paintings OF the alleged brain
under the noses OF law abiding citizens,
inviting scOrn and cOntzImelY, braYely
laughing at their own salt Theum humGr
and never acquiring the moral courage &c
take a grand North American tumble tC
themselves.
Most people dislike to give needless
pain. Unless a man is cruel and deYIilsh
in his disposition, he will not twice in the
same manner wound the feelings Of his
friend; and yet we are constantly running
across the man who has again and again
gTieyed and saddened the hearts of his
friends with the same depressing tale,
r5surEected ff0m the humorous eatacOmbs
or the almanac TO poison the pure air with
its presidential breath.
One thing is absolutely certain to me.
1 feel il as strongly as ever our fOrefathers
felt the 6rst thrO5 of freedom, and 1 Won
der that neither political party has en-
bodied the principle in its platform. This
can never be a peaceful, prosperous and
progressive people, morally and physical
" free, until the strong hand Of the law
shall reveal itself like a club flush and
quarantine the efIete, pestiferOus, miasma-
tic, fungus anecdOte of our boasted
American institutions, which, like the
large red picnic ant has planted itself be
tween the shOulder-blades of liberty and
defes the civil, the military and the naval
forces Of the nation to dislodgeit. Heart
broken sObS